Bohemia
06-06-07, 03:28 AM
Foreword
“There will always be something to ruin our lives, it all depends on what or which finds us first. We are always ripe and ready to be taken.”
-Charles Bukowski
This quest is rated "M" for a mature audience, those with at least the mental age of 18 that can understand that this is writing and is not to be taken offense to. It is rated as such for graphic language, some substance abuse, and sexual content.
"King! King!!"
The peoples of all the known seven nations had come to Corone to line the sidewalks of the main streets in neat little rows, faces of dozens of shades smiling. The noise was finally welcome, for they were finally cheering him. He wasn't sure what he'd finally managed to do, but the important thing was that it had been right, and that he was finally getting the credit he deserved, as they pushed their broad shouldered sword toting heroes to the side and gave him this grand parade. The sun broke from the clouds, and it's light was finally welcome, for it showed his peer's adoration, and as it fell across him and spread it's warm amber light across his face, he was the most handsome man in all the world...
"King! Wake your fat ass up!"
Reality punched him in his sagging beer gut. The light shifted from it's inviting golden tone to a harsh and stinging white, driving into his squinting, blinking eyes like knives.
He should have known. This was the real world, the one where a luckless fuck like himself was dumped into a run down shack fixed up to pass as an apartment for three gold pieces a week. He groaned and shoved his bulk up against the head board of his bed and sluggishly pulled on a black shirt, pocked with tiny circles of cigarette burns. Brass rattled and the door flung open with a bang that made him jump, causing the box spring to squeak in agony.
There in the frame of the door cut the silhouette of one of the thinnest men he had ever known. The practical, simple light of the damned sun did not flatter him, hid his steel gray eyes and aquiline nose and thin, severe knife slash of a pair of lips in the shadow of his own peaked head. An old gray shirt hung from his narrow shoulders, either hand on his hip, thinking perhaps he was striking some fear of authority into the lazy son of a bitch laying in his dirty rented bed. But he wasn't, at least, not with his little pot belly. It was a sad thing to see; hanging over his scuffed brown leather belt, as though all the fat had gathered and settled right there on his body.
"The sun's been up for seven hours now! Has all the vodka settled in your ears, you can't hear my knocks?"
"I was sleeping, asshole," Jon snapped, brushing ashes off the blanket that covered the lower half of his out of shape body, smearing black and light gray over the the itching wool of it. His hand found a cigarette from the smashed pack on the nightstand, and he lit it with a stubborn match that refused to ignite even after he drug it across a patch of rust on the bed frame half a dozen times.
"Don't you know there's a god damn war being fought for the people's freedom? For your sake?" The slash of a man walked into the creaking apartment, at the silent behest of Jon, crossing immediately to the lone window, under which sat a water stained, pale desk. On it was a heavy looking black type writer, imported form Alerar and swiped from the bazaar one night in the company of a bunch of kids.
"I don't have a sake. I couldn't give a rat's ass less if every man in this country killed each other tomorrow. Collins, what the hell exactly do you want?"
"I came to make sure you weren't dead." The landlord stood for a moment with his back to Jon, then smacked the side of the type writer. "At first, I was kept up all night, hearing this thing; clickety clack, clickety clack! All god damn night long!" Scowling as he took a drag from the cigarette, Jon pondered driving a knife into that thin back. The bastard was lying, with the distance between the three door shack and his own run down house, there was no way he could have heard him the night prior as he was struggling to type another useless manuscript.
"It was quiet for a while, and then you started making awful noises. Oh, like the walking wounded! Howling and moaning to no one at all, I thought you were setting up your suicide!"
"Fuck you!" Jon sprang from his bed, dressed only in his shorts. Suicide was for cowards, and he wasn't yellow in any inch of his skin. His life and body, even as doughy as it had gotten, was all he had left, and it at least felt somewhat good to own them. "I give you the rent, you leave me the good god damn alone!"
"Fine, fine!" Collins crossed quickly to the door, scowling and throwing his hands into the air, his legs working fast like the blades of a pair of scissors. He tugged his keys from the door's lock, but paused before shutting it. "Just don't you die in here! I'll toss your bloated corpse off a peir! No respectful funeral!"
"Piss off," Jon growled to the unwavering door, dropping down to sit on his broken bed.
“There will always be something to ruin our lives, it all depends on what or which finds us first. We are always ripe and ready to be taken.”
-Charles Bukowski
This quest is rated "M" for a mature audience, those with at least the mental age of 18 that can understand that this is writing and is not to be taken offense to. It is rated as such for graphic language, some substance abuse, and sexual content.
"King! King!!"
The peoples of all the known seven nations had come to Corone to line the sidewalks of the main streets in neat little rows, faces of dozens of shades smiling. The noise was finally welcome, for they were finally cheering him. He wasn't sure what he'd finally managed to do, but the important thing was that it had been right, and that he was finally getting the credit he deserved, as they pushed their broad shouldered sword toting heroes to the side and gave him this grand parade. The sun broke from the clouds, and it's light was finally welcome, for it showed his peer's adoration, and as it fell across him and spread it's warm amber light across his face, he was the most handsome man in all the world...
"King! Wake your fat ass up!"
Reality punched him in his sagging beer gut. The light shifted from it's inviting golden tone to a harsh and stinging white, driving into his squinting, blinking eyes like knives.
He should have known. This was the real world, the one where a luckless fuck like himself was dumped into a run down shack fixed up to pass as an apartment for three gold pieces a week. He groaned and shoved his bulk up against the head board of his bed and sluggishly pulled on a black shirt, pocked with tiny circles of cigarette burns. Brass rattled and the door flung open with a bang that made him jump, causing the box spring to squeak in agony.
There in the frame of the door cut the silhouette of one of the thinnest men he had ever known. The practical, simple light of the damned sun did not flatter him, hid his steel gray eyes and aquiline nose and thin, severe knife slash of a pair of lips in the shadow of his own peaked head. An old gray shirt hung from his narrow shoulders, either hand on his hip, thinking perhaps he was striking some fear of authority into the lazy son of a bitch laying in his dirty rented bed. But he wasn't, at least, not with his little pot belly. It was a sad thing to see; hanging over his scuffed brown leather belt, as though all the fat had gathered and settled right there on his body.
"The sun's been up for seven hours now! Has all the vodka settled in your ears, you can't hear my knocks?"
"I was sleeping, asshole," Jon snapped, brushing ashes off the blanket that covered the lower half of his out of shape body, smearing black and light gray over the the itching wool of it. His hand found a cigarette from the smashed pack on the nightstand, and he lit it with a stubborn match that refused to ignite even after he drug it across a patch of rust on the bed frame half a dozen times.
"Don't you know there's a god damn war being fought for the people's freedom? For your sake?" The slash of a man walked into the creaking apartment, at the silent behest of Jon, crossing immediately to the lone window, under which sat a water stained, pale desk. On it was a heavy looking black type writer, imported form Alerar and swiped from the bazaar one night in the company of a bunch of kids.
"I don't have a sake. I couldn't give a rat's ass less if every man in this country killed each other tomorrow. Collins, what the hell exactly do you want?"
"I came to make sure you weren't dead." The landlord stood for a moment with his back to Jon, then smacked the side of the type writer. "At first, I was kept up all night, hearing this thing; clickety clack, clickety clack! All god damn night long!" Scowling as he took a drag from the cigarette, Jon pondered driving a knife into that thin back. The bastard was lying, with the distance between the three door shack and his own run down house, there was no way he could have heard him the night prior as he was struggling to type another useless manuscript.
"It was quiet for a while, and then you started making awful noises. Oh, like the walking wounded! Howling and moaning to no one at all, I thought you were setting up your suicide!"
"Fuck you!" Jon sprang from his bed, dressed only in his shorts. Suicide was for cowards, and he wasn't yellow in any inch of his skin. His life and body, even as doughy as it had gotten, was all he had left, and it at least felt somewhat good to own them. "I give you the rent, you leave me the good god damn alone!"
"Fine, fine!" Collins crossed quickly to the door, scowling and throwing his hands into the air, his legs working fast like the blades of a pair of scissors. He tugged his keys from the door's lock, but paused before shutting it. "Just don't you die in here! I'll toss your bloated corpse off a peir! No respectful funeral!"
"Piss off," Jon growled to the unwavering door, dropping down to sit on his broken bed.