Dropping Like Flies (1051 hits)
Category: UberMadness!Rating: 0.58 on 90 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by UberMadness! (View user info) at 2006-09-25 14:50:36 EDT
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Entry 1
I pulled on the pants of my suit, wincing as the waistband clinched tight to the fleshy overhang of my stomach. It had been almost two years since it had come out of the closet and it was obvious that I had let myself go considerably in that time. I briefly considered throwing it away and buying a new one but the thought rapidly passed. For all the occasions I needed it, I would have grown out of it before I got any use from it.The envelope lay on the dresser, the unmistakable scrawling handwriting on the front. Inside a newspaper clipping and a post it note, the cause of my discomfort both in my clothes and in my mind.
"Six Down".
The words on the note looked more like a crossword clue than something to bring a feeling of dread, but the words that Stretch had omitted were more important than those he had written. The cold details in the clipping passed me by, we would all be remembered in the same way eventually, but the important details were etched in my mind. The time and the place.
Four times in the last five years I had received these envelopes from Stretch, always the same format, a clipping and a note. Since I had moved away from Berkeley to the Bay, I had not taken an interest in the press, in particular the obituaries. Stretch however, had decided it was his duty to keep me informed of the news in regard to the old crew, in a way that typifies the stilted correspondence between two men who would really rather not be in touch. Christmas and Birthdays aside, this letter would be the last of its kind, those unsaid words, confirming what we both knew.
"Two to go".
The Chapel was almost deserted when I parked my rental around the side and I suspected that it would remain that way for this service. Guys like us didn't allow too many people to get close.
Stretch was waiting for me in the entrance and we embraced like brothers. No words passed between us, that was for later, as we made our way to the small room set aside for the ceremony. Six times we had carried out this routine, the number of mourners getting fewer with each occasion.
The mahogany casket lay at the head of the room, draped with the flag. There were maybe twenty people in attendance of which half looked to be professional mourners. The two that stood out were in uniform, all polished brass and leather, there to perform the presentation of the flag to the family, if there was anyone there to receive it. The sight of these two uniforms always aroused an anger in me that I had thought was long dead. Even though I knew they would be there, I still felt that they were intruding into a private moment. It almost felt as if they were rubbernecking on an accident, which they themselves had caused.
The service itself was brief, which I appreciated and the flag was presented to a guy in his early twenties, which surprised us both. We were ready to follow our routine when we were approached by the young man who introduced himself as Chops' son. We knew then that things were going to be different. We were going to have to go into detail and tell the story in full and damn the consequences.
In many ways it was for the best. Things like this shouldn't just be allowed to be forgotten. People needed to know what made us the way we were.
I drove my rental back to the hotel and called a cab to take me back to Brady's, an old haunt from my Berkeley days and waited, nursing a beer, for the two guys to arrive. I had selected a booth at the very back of the bar to keep from being overheard, an unnecessary precaution as the place was deserted. I sipped slowly on my beer, fully aware that there was a long day ahead of me.
I was just draining my beer when Stretch and Chris, Chops' son, arrived. They walked over with a fresh round of beers and a bottle of expensive scotch. After drinking a toast to Chops, I glanced across at Stretch who nodded his assent for me to tell our story.
===============
It was in November of '71 that I got busted out of college. They had started cracking down on all the freaks and hippies when the war protests started getting violent and I was arrested carrying enough pot to keep me high for a month. Wrong place at the wrong time I guess. In truth it was probably for the best. I was failing badly, I hadn't been to a class for weeks as I was far more interested in the social side of proceedings and was rarely without a baggie of something about my person.
The arrest freaked my parents. The thought of their son with a criminal record was unthinkable. What would my father tell his friends at the Rotary Club?
While that was on their mind, my concerns were on waiting for the draft form to drop into the mail box. I knew that they wouldn't touch me until I had seen my day in court, but once that passed I was going to be their number one priority. I was considering skipping out to Mexico or Canada, but after the trouble I had put my folks through, I didn't want to do any further damage.
The judge and prosecutor made it easy for me. I got the choice of a year (minimum) in jail or to "volunteer" for the army.
I found myself on a bus with around twenty other guys all of who had taken the same option as I had. We went off to camp for basic training, which was very basic. I guess that by this point they were struggling so badly to get guys to go out that they rushed them through as quickly as they could. After a short visit home to my parents, who loved my short hair and uniform, we returned to base for shipment to Vietnam in early February '72.
When I got back to base, I learned that I was to be assigned to 67th Company, along with seven others from our graduating class who would be my new roommates. We met up that night. I can't say that we got along. Although we all got drunk together on our last night of freedom, it wasn't until we arrived in 'Nam that we bonded and became a unit.
The company knew what we were and didn't care for it. These were career boys, proud of their military prowess and not happy at being saddled with a bunch of criminals. This did have some advantages for us as we were left to ourselves for the most part, often remaining in camp while the "real" soldiers went out on reconnaissance. It did however, mean that we got allocated the worst jobs. Latrines, Garbage and, worst of all, Body detail. We quickly became known as "S Squad" or "Shit Squad", which made us bond much more quickly than any other force could have done.
As well as Stretch and I, there were Fitch, Okie, Freak, Pops, Bull and Chops, your Father. They called me Brains or Prof on account of my year of college. I think you can guess how Stretch got his name. Pops was the eldest of us all and Bull the biggest. Fitch managed to keep his real name, Okie was a true redneck, Freak would do just about anything to alter his mental state and Chops wore Elvis style sideburns from the day I met him.
We got pretty tight in a short space of time. You needed people to have your back in situations like that and when most of the company though you were no better than something they should scrape off their shoes, you took your friends where you could.
We drifted through most of our time, doing what we could to make the time pass. Freak helped us on the way by introducing us to the local specialty, Pot and Opium mixed. It is not something I am proud of, but it was rife over there and anything that took away the boredom and the fear was welcomed by the troops on the ground.
In a lot of ways it was that stuff that kept us together even after we came back home, but it also got us into the trouble that is at the heart of this story.
We had been in country for about a year without having to leave the camp on more than a dozen times, with the exception of forays into the local village for drink, women or drugs. Most of the Company was out on recce leaving only the eight of us and the camp guards back at base. Freak decided we needed some R & R, so he took us to his latest haunt, a place called "Ho Min", a combination Brothel and Opium Den. We were greeted by the hostess herself, a woman in her fifties, and taken into the most dilapidated establishment I can ever remember seeing. It was hotter than hell and the bugs were as thick as fog, but we trusted Freak when it came to these issues.
We were immediately provided with our poison of choice, the usual opium laced pot, and left to our own devices. We had drunk three fifths of Jack en route to the whorehouse and the strength of the smokes rapidly pushed us towards oblivion. I vaguely remember a group of girls being paraded into the room amid the swarming flies and mosquitoes. Ho Min entered and laughed, shouting something that I don't remember before I passed out.
When I came around, there was an horrific scene in front of me. One girl was laid nude on the floor and she was bleeding and bruised. Five of the guys were naked and laid around in various stages of consciousness, Bull was still busy with the girl, punctuating his thrusts with slaps to her face and blows to her body. I could see blood on the bodies of everyone except Stretch and I, leaving me in no doubt over what had gone on. Bull eventually finished and crawled off the top of the battered girl. She slowly left the room.
It could have been hours later, but I suspect it was minutes, that Ho Min stormed into the room screaming at us. I was never much on the language, but I recognised the word "daughter" in her vocabulary. I also noticed for the first time that the room was free of all the flying bugs. We were chased out of the brothel by a woman who stood five feet and weighed in at no more than one hundred pounds. Fighting our inebriation we made our way back to camp, where we dropped back into our sleep.
You might think that I would have had nothing to do with those guys after that, but you would be wrong. They were my only friends in Vietnam and besides, it was only a slope, a gook, a slant. Most of them would kill you as easily as they would fuck you. We put the incident to the back of our minds and carried on doing our grunt work around the camp.
Around three months later we were all shipped out back to the States. That is all I can tell you. The rest is down to Stretch.
===============
Stretch left the table to visit the restrooms and we waited in silence. Although I knew this part of the story as well as Stretch did, this was his interlude. I would probably have to take the reigns again, but it was important that he put in his part. He had witnessed it and needed to put it his way.
Stretch returned to the table and cast a longing glance at the scotch bottle, which remained almost full. Dragging his eyes away he gripped his beer and began to speak.
==============
I didn't fuck her. I didn't even touch her, that's the first thing you need to know. I didn't pass out as early as the Prof did, but it wasn't much. What I saw freaked me the fuck out. I welcomed the escape that those loaded joints provided me.
I remember the girls coming in and Ho Min following them. When she shouted, before all the shit started to go down, all those fucking bugs just dropped dead on the floor. It was like some sort of slope voodoo. If the guys weren't already so wasted and horny, they might have noticed too but maybe not. Those bastards seemed to like me. I spent my year in 'Nam constantly scratching at the bites those little fucks gave me, so I sure noticed them drop.
I remember the girl too. She was different from the usual whores. She seemed almost shy and she was so young. Bull took a shine to her right away. I dunno if young was his thing or whether he just enjoyed the idea of fucking a piece of new meat, but the other guys soon got on his wavelength. I know all the girls left apart from this one and she was aware that she was taking on the troop. It didn't seem to phase her, but then she didn't know what it would turn into.
I passed out not long after that and before any of the fucked up shit started to go down. I was different from Brains 'cos I didn't need anyone to watch my back. I had been a loner most of my life and that shit makes you tough. I stuck around the squad but only because we were all tarred with the same brush. Things were different between us after that, but when we came back Stateside, it didn't seem to matter that much. It was like a different world. I kept in touch with all the guys, through the Vets meetings along with other things.
===============
Stretch had resumed his usual silence and I knew it was up to me to continue. After ten years of keeping quiet it was hard to let it out, but I still felt that someone needed to know. When Stretch and I signed off, someone would know why and it was my job to provide the details.
===============
When we came back I had managed to get myself a serious habit. I spent most of the next two years trying to get my fix and doing what I had to do to achieve it. I had nothing on Freak.
He was crazed. Any high would do. I had seen him spike a vein a few times in Vietnam, but when he got back he embraced it with a passion. I don't think I ever saw him straight. He was the first to go. He managed to hit an artery in a shooting gallery and bled out. We didn't think about it at the time, but later we started to question how he had missed. Someone as experienced as him would know what he was doing. It wasn't until later that we made the connection.
Fitch went next. He took the easy way out. The barrel of a .38 will do the job as good as anything. Okie was a surprise. He had gone back to college and seemed to be doing well, until he got pulled over by a cop one night. He pulled a gun on the cop and ended up on the wrong end of a service revolver.
Pops was killed working at a 7/11. A robbery gone wrong. He was the one who made us think something was going on. Bull ended up bleeding to death after some whore shot him in the crotch. The judge took one look at the bruises on her face and body and declared self defence. Chops was last, another one sucking on the business end of his gun.
Pops had filled us in on what happened in Ho Min's, he also left me enough money to get out of Berkeley and down to the Bay and open my bookstore. The guys had started off just wanting to all be with the same girl, I guess it was a bonding exercise, but by the second time around she had started to get tired.
Freak had decided that her time wasn't up and took what he wanted with the assistance of his fists. The others had followed.
They had died in the order they fucked Ho Min's daughter.
As she had chased us out of her house, she had screamed at us.
I was never great at picking up the language, but it was something like this.
"You are lower than insects. You deserve life less than they do."
Now there are just me and Stretch left. We weren't involved so we don't know whether we are included in what she did to the guys. If we are, then you know. If not we got lucky.
===============
I looked across at Chris, waiting for his response.
He stared back at Stretch and me for what seemed like an eternity, until eventually he picked up the scotch bottle and poured a large draught into each of our glasses.
"To remembrance and regret.", he raised his glass.
We drank with him.
- VS -
Entry 2
No one knew where the giant had come from. He showed up one Friday as the tail end of the lunch crowd was clearing out and spent the rest of the day nursing a large green tea and staring sullenly out at the parking lot. I remember the day because it was that big snowstorm that closed all the schools, and you could barely even see the traffic through the crazy swirling snow that blurred out the world and made the cars crawling slushily down the highway sound distant and unreal.It was just as well the blizzard was keeping away most of our regular clientele, because the sight of the giant hunched over his mug like an extra from a Viking theme park staffed by ex-wrestlers and pituitary cases would have sent them scurrying before the milk for their skinny decaf caps was even frothed. He lurked at his table like a thundercloud, matter-of-factly dwarfing everything else in the place.
Meg and Larissa wouldn't go out to bus the tables while he was there. They hovered just inside the kitchen door, where they could peek out at him from behind the counter, and giggled about his hat and told war stories about the biggest guys they'd ever had. My only recourse to strangling them was to go out myself to wipe down the tables and sweep the dirty plates and glasses from each into the plastic tub.
The giant's presence filled the room in a way I wouldn't have believed possible. Just the force of his consciousness was like a hard shove to the chest. I was pretty sure they weren't filming any Viking movies in town, although if some Hollywood mogul had chosen to do so, he couldn't have picked a better month for it. And he couldn't have asked for someone with more charisma if the love child of Thor and Marilyn Monroe had shown up to for a screen test. The giant scowled out into the snow with the kind of focus Paul Bunyan brought to chopping down trees, and occasionally took a noisy slurp of his tea and wiped the drops from his beard with the back of his hand.
A trickle of my diehards came by on their way home from—or back to—work, but none of them stayed. A glance at the giant was enough to stop them in their tracks and get their caffeine fix to go. Fuck it, I was happy to have the slow day; not that I could concentrate on the novel I was reading with HIM in the room. I flipped on NPR and let some story about a tsunami in the Norwegian Sea fill the silence in a dry kind of background marginally less irritating than the static of dead air.
I sent the girls home. We sure as hell weren't getting any more customers after nightfall, not in this fucking weather, and not with the giant hulking there at table one. If they were just going to sit and giggle uselessly, they could at least do it where I didn't have to listen. Or pay them. They chose to leave through the back door.
Between the surreally intense snowstorm with the wind caterwauling between the parked SUVs, the almost totally empty shop, and the rapidly lowering twilight, I couldn't stop myself from breaking the silence.
"Get you some more tea, bud?"
The giant ignored me. He was muttering something under his breath, in a language apparently based on the sounds cats make when you step on their necks.
"I said, you want some more tea? We're closing up in twenty minutes. You're gonna have to find some other fortress where you can look out over your dominion and plot the downfall of mankind."
The giant didn't turn from the window, but his reflection made eye contact with me. His voice was so deep the words were not so much heard, as felt by their reverberation.
"The time is upon us. Heroes and gods from the nine corners of creation journey towards the battle-plain of Vigrid, and the clans of giants have set sail on Naglfar, the ferry of nails. Of all the downfalls nigh, mankind's is the one requiring the very least plotting. Interrupt my vigil again, and your doom shall arrive on raven's wings before even the great wolf Skoll devours the sun and Jormungand stains the shattered sky with poison. Are we clear?"
I wanted to laugh at the speech, but I was afraid if I unlocked any of my muscles I'd piss my pants. He carried off the threat without a hint of self-consciousness or pretension, which was my first clue he hadn't just wandered away from whatever Swedish death-metal outfit was on tour this week. What froze me in my tracks was the hint of dry mirth with which he'd responded to the idea of the extinction of the human race. There are instinctive responses to certain situations, buried deep in our brain stems and hardwired by millions of years of natural selection, that still serve us well even when we're standing in a strip-mall coffee shop at twenty to ten on a Friday evening in the twenty-first century. The overpowering urge to shut the hell up and resist the wisecrack when confronted by a surly mythological giant with doom on his mind is one such response.
"I take it by your silence you understand me. Good. Then I will have more of the elixir you call tea. I find it strangely invigorating. It lends me enhanced mental acuity and helps the time until my rendezvous with destiny pass more quickly. With a splash of goat's milk to cut the acidity."
Every cell in my body wanted to leap into action to do what he asked. But what was I gonna do? I'm ready for the freaks that take skim milk in their brew, but goat's milk? The granola types head to the organic place down on Church, they wouldn't be caught dead at a chain.
"We don't have goat's milk. Skim, 2%, whole, half-and-half, or cream."
I got the impression people didn't choose to give disappointing news to the giant very often. He actually turned to face me, and I noticed he'd crumpled and torn up the edge of his table without noticing it. He stared hard at me, as if he suspected I was having a joke at his expense.
"No goat's milk? You have fire, you have drink, you seem to have meager food, of a sort. How can you not have goat's milk? Do you dare make sport of Surt, who will burn the worlds black and see them sink into the sea?"
This time, some response was called for. I said the only thing I could.
"Well, uh, we usually do, only uh, with the blizzard our supplier... well, the time is upon us, I'm sure I don't have to remind... you know, the goats are kind of off their feed, with the gods battling and everything."
He stared at me for a long, uncomfortable moment, but apparently the inability to grasp irony is a flaw not restricted to Swedish death-metal bands. He grunted, rattling the glassware behind the bar.
"Cream, then. And bring me one of those gooseberry muffins, it's going to be a long night."
I didn't have the heart to tell him the muffins were cranberry-orange. It wouldn't have mattered anyway, he was off again on a rumbling, declamatory oration, jabbing his finger at the air or at the ground as the moment demanded.
"You may be a mere mortal, and a humble shopkeep at that, but I can see that even a wretch like you knows the truth of the matter; that the Doom of the Gods is upon us. The endless winter has begun, when brother slays brother and the harbors are choked with ice. Even now the wolf has arisen to devour the stars, and the Midgard Serpent writhes and thrashes in torment at the roots of the Earth. Know then, peasant, that your rude hovel of commerce is in fact a crossroads, where Frey of the Aesir, the lord of the sun and king of the elves, also called Yngvi, world-god, owner of the golden boar and the arrow-swift longship Skidbladnir, terror of the whale-road, must pass. On this very night, in fact. I shall kill him when he passes by, and at that moment all the gods must into battle join. Odin shall fall to the great wolf Fenrir, Thor will suffer the wracking poison of the serpent, and Loki shall triumph on the rainbow bridge. Then will I spread fire across the world, and ally and enemy together will perish in flame. This is written in the roots of the world tree. So it is and shall ever be."
There's not much you can say to that. That little hindmost part of my brain stem was telling me it was all true and it explained things like the Kennedy Assassination, the Bank of England, and the Fluoridation of Water. My cerebellum decided to act as if I had a customer telling me the pointless, stupid, predictable details of his shitty screenplay... again.
"Well, you got the right weather for it. Kind of suck if endless winter started in July. Ruin the mood a bit, eh? I'll bring that muffin out with your tea."
But he was back to his muttering. I caught "...no bleeding goat's milk... Ragnarok's too good for 'em..." before he lapsed back into guttural proto-old Norse.
I don't really remember much about the next half hour or so. I brought him the tea on autopilot because conscious thought had left the building. It didn't even occur to me to be worried he'd have a problem with the muffin. Mostly I remember the face of the clock across from the bar. Guess I was just staring at it for a long while. The ceaseless buffeting of the wind on the storefront and the hypnotic swirl of snow seemed to keep time from flowing at its normal pace.
It didn't even really register when a big, black, shiny tour bus slid to a halt on the empty expanse of asphalt outside, brakes squeaking and hissing fitfully. It took a few moments before I realized there were new glows in the window apart from the reflection of the giant's eyes, and that they were brake lights.
The front door crashed open, hurled by a gust of wind, and a man half-fell in, propelled by the same burst and wreathed by snowflakes. Blessedly, he was normal-sized. Average height, getting a little stout around the middle, haloed by long, lanky yellow hair, and with features that gave him an oddly pouty look. He was wearing leather pants and a leather shirt that did little to contain his stomach. Something about him looked vaguely familiar, and I squinted out the window, recognizing the outline of a guitar painted on the bus.
"Hey, boy am I glad to see you're still open," he said, "I could kill for a cup of coffee right now."
As the blond man started towards the bar, the giant rose from his table, his form seeming to overflow the boundaries of his body and fill the room, blacking out all the light and casting his own reddish glow.
The blond man didn't notice. He was standing right in front of the "Order Here" sign, lips moving as he read the menu on the wall behind my shoulder. The giant tapped him lightly.
"Yngvi, lord of the Sun?"
The man whirled in irritation, seemingly oblivious to the sheer hulking terror of the giant.
"Who the fuck wants to know? I ain't signing a single goddamn autograph for anything less than a D cup, okay? You don't even want to know what kind of fucking day I've had, okay?"
The giant didn't appear to move at all. One moment he was there looming over Yngvi, and the next he was looming over a charred corpse. The only indication there had been any movement at all was a blinding flash of light, a lick of flame that scorched the finish on my countertop and singed my eyebrows, and the giant picking something out of one of his fingernails nonchalantly. Then the smell hit, and if there's one smell besides cat's piss that overpowers freshly brewed coffee, it's freshly incinerated rockstar.
The next thing I knew, there was a cop leaning over me splashing cold water on my face. I was flat out on the floor behind my bar, but if I tilted my head up I could see the smoldering remains of a shiny black tour bus through a living veil of snowflakes.
"Hey Al, this one's gonna make it," the cop said, and helped me up to a sitting position. I blinked and tried to clear my head, because the cop was standing upright, but we were eye to eye as I sat lumpen on the floor. He handed me a paper cup and I drank reflexively. Ice water.
The other cop came around the end of the bar and leaned on the pastry case. He was eating a bearclaw. "You the manager here?"
I nodded.
"Plowing crew reported the bus on fire outside your place. We got here right after fire, spotted your place all torn up. You know this guy sliced up and scorched like Mongolian barbecue here?"
"Yngvi somebody. Never met him before. Didn't know him."
"Well, someone obviously knew him well enough to take a flamethrower to him, and a big edged weapon, maybe a sword. Marine saber, or a replica type deal. You get a look at the perp?"
I cleared my throat and drank some more water. "Yeah, he was here all afternoon, came in out of the snow. Big guy."
The dwarf cop looked at me skeptically. "Your customers always come in here with flamethrowers and cavalry sabers?"
"I didn't see anything like that. Just a big guy, like NFL, pro-wrestler big. Eight feel tall, like. Seriously, you guys go looking for an eight-foot tall blond with a beard, a sweater like you'd buy at a Swedish airport, and a viking hat with horns, you can't miss him. Didn't have any guns or knives that I saw though. Just came in and drank some tea."
"I... see. Maybe we should have a paramedic check you out, you might be suffering from shock. We'd expect it, after something like this. So, this guy do anything unusual, or say anything about why he was in town, what his plans were?"
I thought about the weird charisma the giant had had, how his presence filled the place with a kind of hushed awe that went beyond the normal sound-deadening of deeply drifted snow; I thought about the ruddy light behind his ice-blue eyes, and the bizarre, messianic tirade he'd delivered when I got him his refill; lastly I thought about the licking, snapping tongue of flame that had burst from his fingers while Yngvi had vacillated between a cappucino and a latté. Nah. What's the point? Some things just won't fit neatly into a little notepad designed for traffic incidents and domestic violence calls.
"Uh, no, nothing unusual. Just... you know. Well, he said it was time for the destruction of all the powers, a wolf or something was going to eat the sun, and a serpent would devour the world. Oh, and it was the doom of the gods."
The cop rolled his eyes at me, and his partner chuckled. "Yeah, tell me about it, they been dropping like flies all day. Okay, someone from the precinct will be around to take a full statement tomorrow, if there's time."
Entry 1:
absolutes
Antioxident
apollo88
AsshOly
Axolotl
BadAssJulie
Beano312003
Bigmike
Bubba2341
CaptainThorns
Clobbersaurus
coley
Confuzitron
darko
Davros
DrogoRoch
EchoBoxing
FunnyAsCancer
Genko
goferforhire
Hirilnara
Jack_McCallum
jgreening
joedaddy
JoeyG
justagirl27
loki
madddonkey255
Magicaddict
Maltese
MandaPanda
Merlina
Orgasmatron
Sacrilicious
Shaun_Rocks
sicosemen
Siren
Soley_Trinity
sparkle_pink
strwbryfanatic
Wicked
William_Q_Percy
38 eligible votes (42 total) *
Entry 2:
Adamdidit2u
august_sobriquet
Ballare
Bob_Dole
Brdn_Nkd
c1ndy
Cinderblock
Circe
Coyote
Crystle
DonkeyOnTheEdge
firefly
GetNakeddd
ghola
gravitas
HotWillie
Impassive-Digressive
indoninja
intellismartness
JMG114
JonnyX
kaos-king
kybernetikum
littledan
NerfHerder
Pentameter
rad1101
Samo
satchel
scourge
Serious_Melvin
simple_catalyst
SPECIALk
St_Jimmy
Stagger_Lee
stevie_says
supadupapupa
thorpe
Wiggles
WingedFoote
38 eligible votes (40 total) *
* Eligible votes are those made by users who had either (A) posted 3+ messages OR (B) written 100+ [lowered from 750+] reviews as of the beginning of the UberMadness! competition.
User Reviews
Submitted by joedaddy (user info) at 2006-09-29 23:26:02 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
#1 was my favorite story of the bunch
it reminded me of my friend jack11058
good company indeed
Submitted by Coyote (user info) at 2006-09-29 20:53:28 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Thanks Davros-
I thought I was going to have a tough challenge when I drew your name for the matchup, and you proved me right. That was a damn fine story you wrote.
Submitted by Davros (user info) at 2006-09-29 17:01:36 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Excellent work Coyote.
Loved your story. I almost voted for it, which would have saved Snark a job.
I was happy enough with mine, but felt that yours was a more complete story.
Congrats.
-Dave
Submitted by drgoatcabin (user info) at 2006-09-29 14:39:31 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
2 had better imagery.
Submitted by Snark (user info) at 2006-09-29 13:58:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I can see why these are tied.
Two very different stories, each with their own strenghts and weaknesses.
I liked the ending of entry 1 better than entry two, and I felt it made better use of the title.
I wasn't crazy about the ending of entry two, it seemed unfinished, but the story line in general was very original and it was exceedingly well written.
In the end, it was lines like this that made my decision clear.
"There are instinctive responses to certain situations, buried deep in our brain stems and hardwired by millions of years of natural selection, that still serve us well even when we're standing in a strip-mall coffee shop at twenty to ten on a Friday evening in the twenty-first century."
""The giant ignored me. He was muttering something under his breath, in a language apparently based on the sounds cats make when you step on their necks."
"It was just as well the blizzard was keeping away most of our regular clientele, because the sight of the giant hunched over his mug like an extra from a Viking theme park staffed by ex-wrestlers and pituitary cases would have sent them scurrying before the milk for their skinny decaf caps was even frothed."
Congrats Author #2
Goddamn, these were good.
Submitted by strwbryfanatic (user info) at 2006-09-29 11:38:05 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Antioxident (user info) at 2006-09-29 08:18:43 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by NerfHerder (user info) at 2006-09-29 00:58:53 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
These were both great.
Submitted by Ballare (user info) at 2006-09-29 00:23:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by SPECIALk (user info) at 2006-09-28 23:50:08 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by AsshOly (user info) at 2006-09-28 19:20:40 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
its hard to votefor one or the other, but as much as i love norse mythology, one has to get it. both were outstanding.
I am 20 minutes late for my class. Fucking geology.
Submitted by Beano312003 (user info) at 2006-09-28 11:40:15 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by kybernetikum (user info) at 2006-09-28 04:59:59 EDT (#)
Ranking: -1
No Comment
Submitted by JoeyG (user info) at 2006-09-28 01:55:03 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2006-09-27 19:46:10 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Greatness.
I'm thinking Jack and Kaos. I'm sorry I have to vote against either of these.
Submitted by Bigmike (user info) at 2006-09-27 15:46:02 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Soley_Trinity (user info) at 2006-09-27 05:25:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by sparkle_pink (user info) at 2006-09-27 02:48:54 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Serious_Melvin (user info) at 2006-09-26 23:58:49 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-09-26 23:19:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I though I voted on this last night.
Entry 2.
Submitted by scourge (user info) at 2006-09-26 18:45:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
couldn't get into entry one at all. sorry.
Submitted by Davros (user info) at 2006-09-26 15:17:41 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by gravitas (user info) at 2006-09-26 14:33:03 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2006-09-26 13:52:03 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
both pretty damn good.
Submitted by loki (user info) at 2006-09-26 13:47:23 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by HotWillie (user info) at 2006-09-26 13:01:33 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by St_Jimmy (user info) at 2006-09-26 12:53:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
1 was good, but 2 was more creative.
Submitted by Adamdidit2u (user info) at 2006-09-26 12:24:27 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by c1ndy (user info) at 2006-09-26 12:13:51 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Pentameter (user info) at 2006-09-26 11:46:54 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Both of them were excellent, but entry 2 just edged it out for me.
Submitted by Magicaddict (user info) at 2006-09-26 10:29:01 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by DrogoRoch (user info) at 2006-09-26 10:15:48 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Good stuff
Submitted by littledan (user info) at 2006-09-26 08:33:45 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
You've unleashed the Fucking Fury! I almost didn't read the second one, on account that #1 was so good, but any story with a big ass viking that kills Yngwie Fucking Malmsteen gets a vote.
Submitted by DonkeyOnTheEdge (user info) at 2006-09-26 07:31:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Man, still as tight as those thirty inch jeans.
Submitted by intellismartness (user info) at 2006-09-26 07:17:36 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Another good matchup.
Submitted by Merlina (user info) at 2006-09-26 04:39:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Bob_Dole (user info) at 2006-09-26 04:32:27 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Both very good.
Submitted by rad1101 (user info) at 2006-09-26 04:29:52 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by kaos-king (user info) at 2006-09-26 03:33:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Oh fuck...
Dear Nazi Christ, I loved both these stories almost equally!!! **weeps**
Submitted by Genko (user info) at 2006-09-26 02:46:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by supadupapupa (user info) at 2006-09-26 01:52:59 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
I just liked the tone a little bit more on #2
Submitted by BadAssJulie (user info) at 2006-09-26 01:49:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
It had a picture
Submitted by SPECIALk (user info) at 2006-09-26 01:33:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
needs less words
Submitted by absolutes (user info) at 2006-09-26 01:01:19 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by WingedFoote (user info) at 2006-09-25 23:51:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
the first was a bit disjointed. I would've liked to see a bit more development from the second, and it didn't have much to do with the title, but it was still intriguing...
Submitted by Orgasmatron (user info) at 2006-09-25 23:37:46 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
No Comment
Submitted by satchel (user info) at 2006-09-25 23:02:07 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-09-25 21:22:14 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by joedaddy (user info) at 2006-09-25 21:06:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
the heavy-hitters have finally arrived
Submitted by Maltese (user info) at 2006-09-25 20:47:57 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
The dude on the right in the pic in #1 looks like he's gonna ass-rape the guitar guy.
Submitted by DonkeyOnTheEdge (user info) at 2006-09-25 20:05:53 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
I actualy liked both of them.
Submitted by JMG114 (user info) at 2006-09-25 20:01:45 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
ALL WILL BE METAL.
Submitted by William_Q_Percy (user info) at 2006-09-25 19:50:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Circe (user info) at 2006-09-25 19:47:42 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Damn. Entry 1 was perfectly adequate, but Entry 2 was amazing.
Submitted by Impassive-Digressive (user info) at 2006-09-25 19:45:05 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Loved both of these. My penchant for Norse mythology pushed it over the line for Entry 2.
Submitted by GetNakeddd (user info) at 2006-09-25 19:09:43 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by coley (user info) at 2006-09-25 19:06:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Both good, one had some unnecessary capitalizations that distracted me but I thought the story was great altogether. Two was pretty good, but almost lost my interest with all the description leading up to the "actual story".
Both good, one gets my vote.
Submitted by EchoBoxing (user info) at 2006-09-25 18:56:57 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
they're both too long
Submitted by jgreening (user info) at 2006-09-25 18:56:44 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by sicosemen (user info) at 2006-09-25 18:31:05 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I just took a massive shit at school.
Submitted by Hirilnara (user info) at 2006-09-25 18:08:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
No Comment
Submitted by Confuzitron (user info) at 2006-09-25 18:02:10 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Crystle (user info) at 2006-09-25 17:34:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
coin flip
Submitted by Siren (user info) at 2006-09-25 17:23:24 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Best two entries so far.
Submitted by MandaPanda (user info) at 2006-09-25 17:17:43 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2006-09-25 17:09:41 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I was hoping to get the Simpsons Valhalla bowling ball comment at the bottom of this one, that would habe been too perfect.
Submitted by ghola (user info) at 2006-09-25 17:08:23 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Clobbersaurus (user info) at 2006-09-25 17:00:53 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Samo (user info) at 2006-09-25 16:52:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by justagirl27 (user info) at 2006-09-25 16:49:28 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Coyote (user info) at 2006-09-25 16:46:17 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by stevie_says (user info) at 2006-09-25 16:43:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by thorpe (user info) at 2006-09-25 16:27:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Entry 2 was freaking awesome.
Submitted by goferforhire (user info) at 2006-09-25 16:25:18 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Wicked (user info) at 2006-09-25 16:13:27 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
revenge killings via karma for the win
Submitted by FunnyAsCancer (user info) at 2006-09-25 16:10:39 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Coinflip...
Submitted by apollo88 (user info) at 2006-09-25 15:49:41 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2006-09-25 15:48:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Okay, this is MEAT.
Another VERY hard call.
I'm going with #1 because there was more heart to it, and because #2 reminded me TOO much of Neil Gaiman's 'American Gods.' Also, I felt I could have read a lot more about the characters in #1.
But I did enjoy #2.
Submitted by madddonkey255 (user info) at 2006-09-25 15:38:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by firefly (user info) at 2006-09-25 15:30:50 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by indoninja (user info) at 2006-09-25 15:29:50 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by simple_catalyst (user info) at 2006-09-25 15:29:21 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
No Comment
Submitted by CaptainThorns (user info) at 2006-09-25 15:26:15 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Tough decision, but Number 1 read a little easier to me.
Submitted by Shaun_Rocks (user info) at 2006-09-25 15:21:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I kind of glanced over these at first, then I saw Ax's comment and went back over and read Entry 1. Really enjoyed it, great writing.
Submitted by darko (user info) at 2006-09-25 15:18:35 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by august_sobriquet (user info) at 2006-09-25 15:17:39 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Shaun_Rocks (user info) at 2006-09-25 15:08:08 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by Wiggles (user info) at 2006-09-25 15:06:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
lame
needs more electro
Submitted by Cinderblock (user info) at 2006-09-25 14:54:05 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-09-25 14:52:52 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Entry One was the best in this competition so far.