5-21-07 | Myth - Writers Forum

silverwriter · 05-20-2007, 11:09 PM

Time for another myth!

I want you to tell me where men and women came from. Tell me about the origins of humans.

The LM is going to be more of a loose one - poetry or prose, no more than 500 words - to get your creativity flowing. The word count is to help the judges have less of a load and to help teach you to put the most content in the fewest words you can.

There are two things I DO NOT want to see with this:

The Bible's account
The evolution theory

This is not the place for you to make a statement about how you feel the Bible/evolution is a myth. Doing so is grounds for possible disqualification.

Try to have fun.

Submissions open: Now
Submissions close and judging starts: June 3rd
Judging ends: June 10th
Scores posted: June 11th

The judges are:

Journyman (if I can wrangle him into it)
ProudestMonkey
Hawke
Chris Miller
and me

The aim for this one is to get your creativity going. Make it funny, make it sarcastic, or make it sweet - just try not to make it too insulting. Play nice.

Thank you to everyone who participates and to the judges (except me).

**The judges are allowed to participate.**

Amber Leaf · 05-21-2007, 04:41 PM

ok so i did manage to edit some of it.

Mouldy World. (499 words)

Mark is lazy. He woke up one afternoon to piles of discarded pizza boxes that left a thin path between his bed and the door. Over time they had built up and a few contained mouldy slices.

“Mark! You slob, clean your room. God knows what kind of life is breeding in there.”

His mother! Always nagging him when he was chilling – the ogre. She didn’t realize he relished the smell. It hid his weed habit. Even though he had to climb rubbish to get to his computer; it was so unfair. It wasn’t her room. Why did she have to give him so much grief?

After smoking a spliff, he fell soundly asleep on the bare duvet, heaped on his bed.

Drifting into a dream, as dark as the void inside the pizza box, Mark became present in another dimension.

He was flying in the sky of a world filled with grand, green fields intermingled with blue lines. Their meandering path started at the odd blue dot that led to a vast grey volume of water. Other lands lay beyond.

Mark swooped down to an area of land he came across with tall stone buildings. Landing with ease, he settled on the pavement of a road with cars that rushed up and down past him, their engines roaring, giving the city vitality that he liked.

Beside the road was a building with a sign saying ‘Municipal Library’. Curiously, in his dreamy state, he climbed the twenty-three steps to the centre of information. He was compelled to know what was inside.

At the reception was a young woman with long, straight, brown hair. Mark blushed as he asked her;

“Have you got any books about evolution?”

He didn’t know why he asked. He knew about this subject. Why would he need to know more?

“Section F1, over there.” She replied, pointing to the right of her desk.

He walked to section F1 and was drawn towards a book on the third shelf down. It was called ‘The beginning of the world’. Opening on a random page, he found a chapter called ‘The Very Start’. It read;

“Recent data has brought us to believe that, although we don’t know what lies beyond our universe, we have found that we evolved from organisms that are similar to mushrooms and cheese. It is suggested that the planets in our solar system contain wheat like interiors.

Recent Telescopic images show a kind of rippled effect through the universe. This would suggest any kind of edge could possibly be that shape”

Mark realized it was impossible and only a dream. He woke in the untidy mess that was his bedroom. Looking down at the discarded pizza boxes with their rippled surfaces he decided to open one. The smell was horrible. Little parasites crawled over the surface of the decomposed garlic and mushroom pizza.

How could he throw it away? He was God. How could he possibly destroy his own creation?

eggo · 05-21-2007, 05:42 PM

Quote:

There are two things I DO NOT want to see with this:

The Bible's account
The evolution theory

Great! There goes my story about a religious tome falling out of a monkey's ass. Damn!

silverwriter · 05-21-2007, 05:50 PM

Go for it, eggo. You know you want to.

Amberleaf, sorry, but:

Quote:

Just a reminder -

IMPORTANT NOTE: Part of exercising your skill in the LM is to achieve being at or under the imposed word count. That is part of the difficulty and an element that adds to the competition environment. All further LMs conducted by yours truly will now have a disqualification feature for those who go over their word count. The word count WILL NOT include the title, only the body of the piece.

Given the oddities of word programs’ word counting, I can understand one or even five words over, but I feel more than that isn’t just giving some room for oddities. I'd say going ten words over the word count is grounds for being disqualified. As I said, I know people who work quite hard to get to that exact 500 mark.

I have a thought that people might think slamming down on rules this way might make LM a bit less fun or enjoyable, but I do know people who grind away at their submissions to make it under the mark. To have someone come along who is over and only get a few points knocked off (if that) can be a bit disheartening. I only enforce this rule because I feel it’s necessary and will to the LM some good. Thank you.

P.S. Feel free to PM me if you disagree.

Amber Leaf · 05-22-2007, 02:34 AM

no youre right silverwriter. ill have a go at re-writing this afternoon.

Mike · 05-22-2007, 06:26 AM

The Shadow’s Test

Godwin Dark drifts through the doors of the Department of Intimacy and Alienation and acts like it’s just any other rotation. Shadows float by on either side of the corridor. Some say hello. Godwin returns their salutations.

Stopping before a triangle door, Godwin looks both ways before entering. A hiss and vapor give way to a round room with mirrors on every surface. Starlight shines through portholes. Godwin becomes lost in the illusion.

“Have we done it?” Godwin asks the lightness.

A gray hue appears. It is Elusa, the waverwright. “We have, but not without rising the suspicion of Shade.”

“How long do we have?”

“It’s a lower frequency than I would have expected. We have ten minutes before arrival.”

“No time to waste! Let me see them.”

A low hum bequeaths a table. Lying on top are two pale forms.

Elusa drifts closer. “Aggregate H-6. I call them humans. They have already been imprinted.”

“What about the test?”

“We dare not. The consequences could be—“

“Consequences?! We must find out. These…these humans, they might know the answer.”

“I would disagree further, but we are doomed as it is. I will arouse one.”

A human stirs. Its eyes open and it slowly sits up.

Godwin approaches. “You are alive, human.”

It shrinks back. “W-Who are you?”

“I am Godwin. We have created you.”

“G-God…Godwin. Why am I here?”

“What a truly absurd question,” Godwin says. “The answer is so simple. But never mind that now, there isn’t time.”

“Time?”

Godwin glances to Elusa. “Not our best work, obviously.”

“Show it the mirror.”

Godwin wheels the cart to the frame. “Look into the depths, human. What do you see?”

The human leans forward and then quickly jerks back. It pauses and tilts its head. Slowly, it raises an arm. It touches the mirror.

“There is someone there, inside. It mimics me.”

Godwin suddenly feels very heavy.

“It can see through the darkness!” Elusa rejoices.

A silence overcomes the room and then the arrival alarm sounds.

“Shade has come!” says Elusa. “What will we do?”

“Our work must survive,” says Godwin. “We shall send them to one of the substratums.”

“But the modulator—“

“There are other ways. Sedate them and follow me. Be quick!”

“Wait—“ the human objects, but Elusa fades it.

They slip through the department doors and make their way against an excited crowd. “The Shadow is upon us!” someone says happily. Godwin quickens the pace.

The antiquated shuttle bay is dusty. The cart’s wheels squeak in the void. Godwin finds a working shuttle, programs the controls, and loads the humans in the trunk.

“You there!” a voice calls out. “Stop!”

But the craft is already lifting, drifting, listing to one side—it disappears out the hatch a moment later.

“Will they be found?” asks Elusa.

Godwin sighs and watches the guards advance on them. “One day.”

“All of our work…wasted.”

“They will endure. We are but shadows to what they might become.”

“I hope you’re right.”

Words: 500

Amber Leaf · 05-22-2007, 10:31 AM

have re-edited it now silverwriter.

Tsaeb XIII · 05-23-2007, 02:16 AM

Out of interest, how far under is acceptable? Is it a similar margin (+/- 5 words), or is there a greater margin allowed?

Either way, 499 words
-----------------------------------------------
Humans - the new Battery Cell

Humans are really quite an insignificant race when you really think about it…

As Bob walked over toward the desk, it wondered what was to become of the mighty race that was the Toothithres. So long had they reigned over the known universe that even the thought of them loosing their dominance, or even having it weakened, was almost inconceivable. Yet, as it looked out through the window, it almost seemed possible. ‘Window,’ it though. ‘A year ago only outdated history lovers had windows. Energy fields are so much better.’

But in the end, everything came down to energy. Nobody had yet figured out how to synthesise it, but everybody needed it. Even with millennia of universal dominance, as well as the associated resources, the Toothithres had run out of supplies which could be harnessed in order to power their race. As the Supreme Governor of the Realm, Bob had always hoped never to see this day.

Natural resources had expired, fusion was still not possible and solar power, while sustaining them for the moment, was not going to allow for any growth whatsoever. Their scientists were working day and night, yet nothing had arisen. Bob turned towards the empty space in its wall where a sound muting holograph would usually fill the gap. ‘At this rate doors will be coming back into fashion.’

Leaving the room, Bob headed towards the lab to speak with the top scientists. This had become a daily ritual for it, and was the last piece of life holding it to sanity. As empty as most of them were, the promises the scientists gave it of new technology kept it clinging to a small amount of hope.

Walking through another empty hole in the wall, Bob was surprised to see a relieved, almost happy, expression on the lead scientist’s face.

“You seem overly happy considering the circumstances Fred,” Bob began. But before it could continue its sentence, Bob was interrupted by the scientist.
“We have a solution. We have finally found a way to create new, unlimited amounts of energy.”
Bob couldn’t believe its ears. “How? Isn’t that impossible? When can you start mass production?”

“There are already 5 prototypes running, and one of them has come out on top by far. You see, what we have done is manufactured tiny Star Systems inhabited by energy producing beings. These then exist within globes showing various star patterns and reflecting energy signals, in order to facilitate development. Within the globes there are also energy receptors, gathering any excess energy produced. This has the added bonus of creating the illusion that energy cannot be created, a law by which we have always lived.”

Bob shook its head in wonder. “So can these be distributed soon?”

“Using the Homo sapiens model we hope that we can be the sole energy supplier within 12 months.”

On a small, rocky object within a dome, a small group of hairy bipeds began to crawl out of a pool of mud.

avea · 05-23-2007, 07:29 AM

Dances

Before the beginning, lived a people, if people you would call them. Little of them is describable; none today could comprehend beings so alien. If they must be labeled, call them gods. These gods had no world, but they wandered freely throughout the nothingness that preceded the world.

Then they died. We may never know what caused the deaths, but die they did, alone, in pairs, in hundreds and thousands. As each died, his soul ignited, leaving a ball of flame flickering in the emptiness until it was filled with points of light and only one of them was left.

She--we shall call her the Lady--cried of grief and loneliness. The tears gathered before her since there was no hill to run down, no ground to soak into. She cried for a thousand lifetimes, and the pool grew vast beyond mortal comprehension. It grew until she had no more tears, and still she cried. Dry dust fell from her eyes when no more water would, dropping into the pool and gathering at its center.

When even the dust stopped falling, the Lady released a wail, which cry spun across the water’s surface. The water rose to greet it, dancing restlessly to its sad music, leaping and flowing, small dances within greater ones.

The Lady fell into the center of her spilled grief, splashing some of the water up, away from the whole. She reached the middle, and she, too, died, her soul igniting. Where fire touched dust, it changed, leaping away, forming islands, then continents.

The water that had splashed away formed its own ball and called to its brethren below, and they to it, each calling the other to join it. The silver ball shrank and grew over time, and the ocean pulled to and fro in their match. One day, the moon could come down to rejoin the rest of itself--or it could swell to new size if it wins away more from the grip of earth, fire, and wind.

Fire burned and wind blew. Though at first the fire burned with fury, eventually its warmth grew more benign, its heat more wholesome. Though at first the wind howled in anguish and the water danced with rage, gradually their sorrow lessened. The water grew joyful, and the wind playful as they danced. The wind tossed the waves high, pulling them up to scatter them across the earth.

Where the four met, they quickened with life, which grew and changed until it filled the earth and water, and even the wind and fire. Nurtured by earth, nursed by wind, warmed by fire, and taught by air, life grew in myriad forms, as different from one another as day from night, for the Lady had died near another god, and they danced a slow dance of their own, sometimes facing, sometimes back to back.

And, after innumerable turnings of their dance, life became what we know as familiar, and from that life we have come.

Loulou · 05-23-2007, 02:27 PM

Pinky
480 words

Megan was six. She couldn’t sleep. The new duvet cover her mother got in the sale was itchy. Her head was itchy too. Questions crawled, like tiny insects, in and out of the crevasses of her brain, preventing slumber.
She rescued Pinky the Rabbit from the folds of her pillow case. She went downstairs. Her mother was loading the dishwasher.
“Mummy, where do we come from?” asked Megan.
“You mean, like, where do babies come from?”
Her mother fumbled with the cutlery.
“No, I mean where do people come from? Where do men and women come from?”
“Ask your father.”
Megan looked for her father. He was on the computer, beer can close by.
“Daddy where do men and women come from?” she asked.
“Hmmm, well women come from hell.”
“Where is hell?”
“My mother-in-laws house on a Sunday.” Her father laughed. He ruffled Megan’s hair. “Go back to bed; you worry about things that shouldn’t concern you.”
Megan tucked the love-faded cuddly under her arm and climbed the stairs, her heart as leaden as her legs.
“They just don’t know the answer,” she whispered to Pinky. “Does anyone?”

She had asked her teacher that morning while she washed the paint pots. “We came from the ocean,” said Mrs Jones. “From fishes. Now stop chatting Megan and get out your reading book.”
Mr Agar in the library told her that once upon a time, many years ago when it was barely light, humans fell from the sky.
“Didn’t they bump when they landed?” Megan was enchanted.
“Oh no dear, it was wonderful,” he whispered. “They floated down. First came the man, mighty and strong. Then came the woman – and he caught her. They came from the stars you see.”

Megan got back into bed. She moved the duvet to her waist so that it didn’t irritate her bare arms. The moon and stars mobile above her head reflected silver sparks on the wall. The curtains fluttered at the window.
“I believe Mr Agar,” Megan said to Pinky. “He’s the cleverest because he looks after all those books. He must know the answer. I think we floated down to earth.”
She fell asleep. Later the itching woke her again. She sat up, pushed the duvet onto the floor. She went to the window. The black sky was scattered with glitter.
“Look at the stars Pinky! Do you think I’ll float?” She leaned over the window sill. The air was cool on her scratched skin. She smiled and reached for the wind.

At first light Megan’s mother unloaded the dishwasher. She looked out of the window. She dropped the blue china plate. She screamed.
“Don’t move her.” Megan’s father kneeled by the limp child. The flowers parted where her head lay. The pulse was weak. An ambulance sounded from the distance.
Pinky the Rabbit, with all the answers, lay at Megan’s side.

defenestrator · 05-25-2007, 10:38 AM

I Think, Therefore...
(178 words)

In the beginning there was a thought, and that thought was everything illegal, immoral, and fattening. And it was good. And the universe saw that it was good, but changed its mind when the first human popped into existence. It really began to regret it when another human popped into existence, and tried to commit suicide (hence the myriad of doomsday theories) when together the humans created new thoughts, spawning the human race like popcorn in a microwave. And this happened for the many generations that came after. This was long forgotten, however, buried under wild tales of gods and monkeys, until a Frenchman - later dubbed the founder of this belief - proclaimed it yet again to the world.**
And today, that original thought is still held in high esteem by its many practioners, and so continues to live on despite the policemen, churches and Weightwatchers of the world.

**There are, however, a group of dissenters who claim that this cannot be, as there are many humans who clearly do not think, and yet they exist in abundant numbers. Scientifically, they say, the theory fails. They claim it was aliens.

silverwriter · 05-25-2007, 07:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tsaeb XIII

Out of interest, how far under is acceptable? Is it a similar margin (+/- 5 words), or is there a greater margin allowed?

Under isn't a problem unless I set a minimum, which I have never done.

mandax · 05-26-2007, 03:05 PM

Mother Nature - 362 Words

Mother Nature was a perfectionist. She strove to create the most beautiful world she could possibly conceive. On her first try, she created vast oceans with sparkling waves and firm ground that yielded foliage the color of the flowing seas. Noticing that she had used too many shades of brown and green, she created animals to populate the earth and roam freely in their colorful splendor. It was then that every color was present in her world.

Soon, however, she began to realize that her world was flawed. The circle of life she had perpetuated would occasionally lead to an imbalance in species’ populations. Sometimes the sun would be too harsh and butcher the fragile shrubs, or the clouds would be too ambitious and drown the helpless plants. She tried to reprimand the sun and the clouds, but they were relentless in their competition. The fallacies that existed shamed her. She made the decision to destroy her spoiled masterpiece. Knowing that it would take many, many years for the animals to consume all of the world’s resources and begin to die off, she chose to create a new kind of living creature.

She created these “Machines Attacking Nature” to be vicious and selfish in their very natures. But MAN could not do this job alone. Because her strength was beginning to dwindle, she was going to give herself a rest and provide MAN a way to reproduce. She created beings for “Working On Machines Attacking Nature,” allowing them to mate and produce more MAN and WOMAN. MAN and WOMAN complimented each other because they were superior in different aspects of destruction. MAN and WOMAN would poach the animals and eat the plants, but to Mother Nature’s utter delight, they would do much more than this. They developed more intellect than she had intended, and they began to make their own creations – their own machines – to mutilate the very land they walked on and the very air they breathed. The environment was slowly dying, but they killed to serve themselves.

Mother Nature smiled. After the elimination of her first draft, she would start anew. Until then, she relaxed.

“It shouldn’t be long now.”

sixlivesdown · 05-26-2007, 03:33 PM

Masters of the World 378 words

It was an important day. Probably the most important day.

The plants had come to Council.

It was time to decide just what was to be done about the Earth.

Now, the trees, they didn’t have a problem with things as it was. They could roam around the planet, growing tall and mighty, without any restrictions save the odd forest fire. But that was healthy, that was part of the cycle of life and death. The trees, they were all in favor of keeping everything the way it was.

But they were the minority. The shrubs and grass, they had some concerns. Namely, the way that the trees were taking over. By growing so widely and so tall, they were blocking space and sun for the smaller plants.

Something had to be done.

The Council ended in quarrels and accusations, as most tended to do. Nothing was decided on, and so the trees left satisfied that nothing was going to disrupt their hegemonic dominance of the planet.

The grass wasn’t going to let that happen though. Meeting in secret, they had to come up with a way to lower the power of the trees.

“We need something that is going to destroy the trees, faster than the fires do,” said one.

“We need something that will need to keep doing it, for generations to come,” said a second.

“We need something that will harm them while not harming us,” said a third. “We need to destroy the trees’ dominance in favor of our own.”

They argued and deliberated long into the night. By the morning, it had been decided on. They spent a month creating it, weaving it with the bodies of martyrs and the good clean earth.

Finally, it was ready. They were huge, though not as big as the biggest trees. They were woven with the promise to nurture the grass and destroy the trees.

They called them MAN.

They were the best idea the grasses had ever come up with. Within just a few short decades, they were chopping down trees at an enormous rate, and cultivating the grass. The grasses had won.

Even today, look outside. What do you see on the lawns? That’s right: grass.

Now you know who really rules the world.

Amber Leaf · 05-26-2007, 04:20 PM

sixlivesdown - that is a right good story.