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Frossty Thoughts - Western Themed
As a bit of an experiment, I took some short snippet of a scene, and tried to make it better, more like how I'd seen it in my head.
This was the original scene:
The trio stood in the distance. All of them had guns drawn. "We won't let you get away with this!" they shouted. Fools, all of them. I stopped and turned towards them. "You won't? How do you plan to stop me?" I asked them. Shots rang out, I raised my hand and deflected the bullets with a mere fraction of my powers. "As I was saying, how..." more shots interrupted me. Again I deflected them, sending enough back at the trio to knock the guns from their hands.
I flexed my fingers, the earth trembled, rippling and bucking around me. A crack formed at my feet, following my outstretched hand towards the trio, they started to run, but great shafts of earth reeled up blocking their escape, the crack widened and moved towards them faster. The walls of earth pushed them forwards, into the open rift in the earth. Screaming they fell in. I closed the hole over them, the screaming stopped, or was perhaps only muffled by the weight of earth.
I returned to my journey.
That was written in probably about 15 minutes. A put an hour or so into the re-write, and this is what I ended up with:
I had been walking across the desert all day. There was a town ahead, I'd seen the smoke of the chimneys in the distance.
Should be there before tomorrow; late tonight if I didn't stop to sleep. It had been days since the last town, and the trail of the man I was after was growing cold.
Three men stood in a close line between me and the town. He must have warned them I was coming. They were here to stop me.
"Hey you!" yelled one of the men. I didn't pay attention to which man spoke. In a few moments, it wouldn't matter. I pitied the man. He probably had a family back in town. People waiting and hoping and praying he'd come back to them safe and alive. I ignored him, in the vain hope they would ignore me. I wanted them to give up and leave me to do what must be done.
"We know who you are!" the man yelled again. "And we know what you are too!" The man spat on the ground. A local gesture of disgust, maybe? I couldn't tell. I'd never lived anywhere long enough to learn local customs. I caught stray thought: A little girl, maybe 6, maybe younger. She had tears in her eyes, crying because her father had to leave them.
She didn't understand why. She probably never would. I kept walking towards them, catching whispered snippets of their conversation.
"Why don't he answer, Luke?" asked the one on the left.
"You think he's deaf? Or maybe he don't understand?" This was the man on the right. He had a deeper drawl than the man on the Left.
"He's not deaf, and he understands us well enough. He just don't want to answer." This was the middle man, Luke. He'd spoken earlier.
"We won't let you get away with this!" Luke shouted. They were fools. They said they knew who and what I was? Didn't they know what I could do to them, with little more effort than an idle thought? I stopped.
"You won't? How do you plan to stop me?" I asked them, my voice calm and level. The three of them drew their guns.
"Like this!" shouted Luke. Shots rang out. I raised my hand and waved the bullets aside.
"As I was saying, how..." more shots interrupted me. Again I deflected them, sending enough back at the trio to knock the guns from their hands. The game had grown tiresome.
"Leave now, and you will be spared." I said. It was not a request. It was not a threat.
"Now you listen here," started Luke, cluthing his injured hand to his chest. I stopped listening. They had been told.
I flexed my fingers and the earth trembled. The ground rippled and bucked. A crack formed at my feet, following my outstretched hand towards the trio. They ran. The crack widened and rushed towards them faster. They fell screaming into the great earthen maw. I closed the hole over them, heedless of their pleading cries. They had been told. Their screaming stopped abruptly, muffled to nothingness by the weight of earth.
For a brief moment, I thought again of the little girl who'd never understand why her father had gone away. I turned back towards the city. When I finally caught up with my prey, I would make him pay for every life lost.
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Damien
In my world, there are no heroes, only really polite villians.
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