Topic: 'The Trooper'- Anomie Cycle

[Onanon]

+++++++++++++++++++++

A lone figure saunters the shattered streets. He surveys bombed-out ruins, the only indication that life once lived. The streets are empty apart from the vaudeville wraith that ghosts through them, footsteps echo through empty urban habitat: 'Tap...tap...tap...'. He walks onwards with no real destination. A fresh morning breeze sweeps the dust through the streets and puts the Trooper in a nostalgic mood. It was peaceful. Almost pleasant.

He stops.

A ruined man lies on his back in the middle of the road, his body a cauterised stump from the waist down. He breathes raggedly. The Trooper gets that promethium heat on the wind, and with it, bitter ashes. To him it smells of defeat. Of immolated ideals now cast to the mercy of four howling, gibbering paths. It was a losing war to begin with, a war fought against the base instincts of man.
 
The Trooper crosses the road for an old friend, on the opposing side. He can still see 'I. Malone' on the defaced uniform. Malone tries to speak: The Trooper is also at a loss for words. What can he say? Evading speech, he lights himself a cigarette. No food or drink, but there's always a cigarette.

The planet is lost. He figures there will be an Exterminatus within the hour. He feels the need to kill himself before it happens, but doesn't want his old friend to die alone. He has a single bullet left in his autopistol.

If he shoots Malone, he himself must wait an hour to die.
If he shoots himself, Malone dies alone.

Malone's lasgun was lifted when he fell by his comrades. He thinks of stabbing his dear friend in the heart or slitting his throat, alas neither of the two have a knife. No broken glass lies on the road, a strange thing even in peacetime in the City. So, he will bash his head in with a nearby lump of concrete. As he thinks this to himself, Malone starts sobbing.

He feels guilty so he shoots Malone through the forehead. He jerks, and sighs.

The Trooper sat in the middle of the road and looked towards the heavens. He watches ethereal ships floating by in the brand new morning, lazy, hazy explosions erupting in the dawn light. A fantastic light show, and the poet in him was stirred by the beauty of it.

He figures he has about forty minutes.

Words crept from cracked lips:
        '...the city...'

He stops.
        Louder now.
               'The city...'

He stops.
The dead must hear this.

'The City is a monster with teeth of glass and steel, that devours, devours, devours!'
 
Dust dislodged itself from a nearby ruin.
He continued, his voice cracking.                             

'Words I had written fifteen years ago...'

+++++++++++++++++++++++++

[Ukos Sa'cea Rienn]

oo...

that was pretty interesting...

Parts of it seemed a bit odd to me though.

for example:

"The streets are empty apart from the vaudeville wraith that ghosts through them, footsteps echo through empty urban habitat: 'Tap...tap...tap...'."

what? I think that says that the streets are empty except for the one person who is silently walking through them. I had a bit of difficulty working that one out though.

All in all though, it was quite the powerful piece, I thought, even if I did have to go back and reread some bits of it to make sure I understood.

Keep up the good work!

-Ukos

[Werwolf Traitor]

Interesting, go ahead!

[Onanon]

++++++++++++++

He flicks open a newspaper in the dusty cafe, setting the slow haze roiling.
City lights, City deaths.

Shut down, the night flipped broken worm guards, strung up broken like kiddies. Uptown sprayed with gutters, by methadone commune. Burnt torn gutter night. Spent, churn out into a pity. Not serenity. Ghetto taking graphed girlfriends, her into a flamethrower. No disturbing the necropolis, addicts to the metropolis. Irons clubbed, the hands of pity, he remains in the City. Snores in a shut wake, no pity for a walled Committee. Who will thirst in the pit, spending the death time trying to get out of it?

Another unknown martyr dies, taking 20 with him.
The cause? No cause, yes, that's the cause.
Incredible release of energy from destruction of the self, used to annihilate the other. Suicide bombings.
Energy, and incomplete tears from the Fabric.

The dissolution of central government today, Anarchy raging against the Sword of Order in the bleeding streets. Insurrectionism a sacred, inalienable right.

It's raining again, a softer truth to block out the harsh drum of machine guns in the cantina, of interrupted cries in the far distance, too close by to do something, too far away for fear. I'll go for a walk, slip on heavy coat over flak, lift a lasrifle, police the peace by the clock, whether that time is right or wrong.

+++++++++

+++++++++

Wandering around. Aimless. Purposeless.

I picked up a gun, went out to a field, kissed it and pulled the trigger.
I was tired of thinking.

The Sergeant turned to me and said I would make a fine soldier.

Walking empty bombed out streets reminds me of those days.

I have no name now, I have no need of one.

+++++++++

+++++++++

Strolling by a lonely interzone, a crack!, and a lasbolt singes my ear.
I throw up my arms and shout: 'Don't shoot! I'm with you!'

I wait and hold arms high to the heavens, and the figure came from upper decayed hab-housing.

Even flak and a lasgun couldn't make her older than 17.
That was nice, I liked them wide-eyed and innocent.

We walked, and then, we talked.

She was a feral girl, raised by dogs until she was 6.
The Girl hated when people said it was a dog-eat-dog world.
Dogs had shown her more compassion.

Mentioned a Doctor, who rehabilitated her.
Can't remember his name, though I really should.

She wore a headband with a pair of dog-ears on it, to remind her of her heritage, though she still acted like a dog sometimes. She drank in my scent, and kissed me wetly.

Neither of us were people persons.
She was a dog, now without a pack.
I was, as ever, alone, so we made the connection.

'We could find a back alleyway somewhere... and beslubber like dogs.'
I growled, stroking her hair and nuzzling her cheek.

She bit him playfully on the ear and took him by the hand.
'I know just the place....'

We walked through the ruins of the red light district, which I moved through with easy familiarity.
We thought we saw a glint of movement in an upstairs window, and decided more people would be welcome.

+++++++++

+++++++++

She was partially skinned.
She had been tied to the bed with rags and lay on stained newspaper.
From the redness around the slit I guessed someone had tried to shave her, as if she wasn't young enough and this was all they could get. A rotten, sperm filled corpse.
I wondered if it was them or us who did it. It hardly matters now.
I sat on a ledge.

The Girl left the room and vomited noisily from the third story window.

Some kind soul had slit her throat, an everyday miracle, though I wasn't sure of the timescale. The flies drank in blood where the buds of breasts had been cut off.
The Girl wiped her mouth and dabbed her eyes.
'Human beings make me sick.'

We left the building down three flights of stairs without saying a word.

+++++++++

+++++++++

We walked and talked of beslubbering.
As things seemed to be reaching a conclusion and as we walked up what I remembered was once a leafy avenue, a hidden heavy bolter position opened up on us. The Girl dropped to the ground without a back. I knew they had been drawing a bead on us as we walked up hand in hand. She looked to me with pleading eyes. She whined and panted.

Ammo must be scarce, they'll finish her with bayonets, like killing a dog.
I was hiding behind a burned out car, out of sight, out of mind.

'I'll get help' as she crawls towards me, bleeding everywhere.
I get up, spring around the corner and then I keep on walking.

Another day, another broken soul.

+++++++++

+++++++++

Walking alone again, this time (or whatever time) in the night.
Intermittently, the world goes white, and I drop to the ground to be shaken by the bucking earth. Armies, armies duelling with new suns as babies boil in pregnant stomachs and flesh creeps and crawls over bone. The City was empty now, though a few broken, warring parties still scarred the streets with small arms and violent minds.
Things had devolved into a gang war.

+++++++++

+++++++++

The sun shone, having no other alternative, on the nothing new.
Down another long thoroughfare, identical buildings either side.
I wrapped my heavy coat around me against the bitter winds of nuclear winter, still tasting radiation in the dusty black flesh of the dead on the breeze.
Atomised humanity could still poison.

I was walking down the central white line when a shout went up almost simultaneously from both sides, then a crack and heat over my shoulder, then more and more until I was draped in red laser thread, some of which pierced my leg. Both sides of the street noticed the presence of each other and promptly engaged, heavy bolters spraying chunks from the faded façade and stubbers  chewing the air to pieces.  The noise was terrific, and as the hell-symphony continued and I hopped around in pain, I felt obliged to take out my autopistol and empty the magazine into the sky, to at last be part of something. I span around blowing holes in the air, tears running down my face.

Both sides brought up rocket launchers and both sides fired simultaneously.
The first frag round took out the roof on one side, broken concrete crumbling to the floor in cinematic slow motion; the second cleared the middle of the building. The lasfire lessened and I shouted in despair. Why was it ending like this?
Both sides brought out the krak, and with the vapour trail still hanging in the air, both buildings crashed to the ground, unable to take the impact, struts breaking out after so many years and impaling men out of sheer hateful spite. The dust cloud raced up and enveloped me, turning the world yellow.

I stood up five minutes later, absolutely caked in dust and death.

'I thought both sides would be better shots.'

+++++++++

+++++++++



The breeze kicked up dust.

'…And then I came across you.'

The Trooper sighs.

'There has to be more to it than this.'

A small piece of rubble breaks from a ruin and tumbles to the ground, the sound of cracking ribs. The Trooper looked to the corpse for an answer.

Then he laughed, a broken, hollow, empty, terrible thing.
He has the last laugh.

Life goes on.
The sun will rise tomorrow.

Ships circle above.
The light still shines.

The Trooper stood, sneered...

And waited for the Rain.

                 
                             +++++END+++++

[Onanon]

I gave myself an hour to write the last part, to try and get the urgency and fragmentation right. He has 40 minutes in which to still exist, and he gets the last laugh against the universe. Nice.

Tell me if it's a mess, tell me if makes no sense.
Usual drill of editing, though I've gotten more stories written than I can currently manage.
I've got barely a week left, and even 1000 words a day might not cut it.

And 'Clean' still isn't up on the front page, after nearly 2 months.

Ah well, nothing to be done.
Peace, and thanks.

[Ukos Sa'cea Rienn]

... Woah ...

That was a lot more... something... than I was expecting...

Well, overall, I thought the story was good, but there were a few particulars that I had some trouble with.

For one, the first italics section made little to no sense to me.

Also, the whole section with the dog-raised feral girl was very effective, but extremely odd. I doubt you should change it, it was just a very striking passage I figured I should point out.

But yeah. Apart from that, there wasn't much else I noticed. Good job with the story, and good luck with whatever else you write.

-Ukos

P.S. "Clean" is good!

[Sir Sam Vimes]

First time I read this I thought that this story has more in common with our world than that of 40k.

This one was very surrealistic, very 'unreal' in some strange way, and I like it. The only thing is that some sections pass by to quickly, like the dead woman in the bed. Personally I wouldn't like to know what has happened there (I'm not into that kind of stuff) but generally the reader needs more to fully understand what's going on, otherwise it just ends up as a grotesque scene. Give us more details, give us more emotions, more, more, more! Or it could end up merely as a series of quick flashes.

Anyways, just my opinion, ignore it if you disagree.

P.S. "Clean" is good!

I second that. Very well done! And good luck in the contest!

[Onanon]

First time I read this I thought that this story has more in common with our world than that of 40k.

Best answered by one of my maxims, 'People change, at they don't change at all'.
In this context it means things will be much the same for most people in the 41st millennium as they are today. The blackness never alters. It's something of a recurring theme for me.

There's very little reference in the story to anything really concrete. The Trooper is suffering under anomie, he doesn't agree with the riots but he doesn't agree with the 'walled committee'. He's outside the society norm, which means horrible brutality on both sides. His societies values are not the kind of values he wants to have. The people of the planet are evil, and this is something I'm going to address in the next piece, 'As It Should Be', Mono's side of things.
He's somewhere outside good or evil, 'police the peace by the clock, whether that time is right or wrong' and isn't really sure where he stands. The opening paragraph at the beginning is at the very end of the war. Evil has won, and the planet is about to be wiped. Only the grey ghost of cause-and-effect outlasts Evil, to be annihilated by the end of all things.

This one was very surrealistic, very 'unreal' in some strange way, and I like it.

Yeah... it was strange how it turned out. I was keeping a leash on the unusual, but this one came out in a dreamy trance of an hour. I really couldn't stop writing for it, I was on a tight timescale. The ending had me in tears of awesomeness in my head that morning, but it seemed blunted somehow. It needs more actual writing.

The only thing is that some sections pass by too quickly, like the dead woman in the bed. Personally I wouldn't like to know what has happened there (I'm not into that kind of stuff) but generally the reader needs more to fully understand what's going on, otherwise it just ends up as a grotesque scene. Give us more details, give us more emotions, more, more, more! Or it could end up merely as a series of quick flashes.

The Trooper is talking to a corpse, with about 40 minutes until everything that ever was is being destroyed. Consciousness is wiped with Cyclonic torpedoes. He is in a rush, but yes, I agree, it does need 'more'. More body to the text. He needs to walk round more as well.

Quote from: Ukos Sa'cea Rienn on Yesterday at 05:37:51 AM
P.S. "Clean" is good!
I second that. Very well done! And good luck in the contest!

Thanks. This was a rewrite of a story I did 3 years ago, taking the basic idea (ragtag trooper finds dying enemy trooper from conquering side, thinks of killing him, but realises he cannot, as they are brothers in the human race. Falls to his knees with tears misting his vision.) I adapted the first part from that, then the rest of the thing seemed to write itself.

'Clean'- That was the first story I had written, originally for a short story part of an exam.

The idea itself was taken from a different project I was working on, and the entire piece sprang from the last 4 lines. That's the third draft of it, and since it's such a short story I could put so much more into a small space. It's been polished, so it'll work better for the contest. I don't really mind what happens with it, I just want to get my custom title!

For one, the first italics section made little to no sense to me.

I'll explain it line by line. The meanings will unfold like a flower.

Shut down, the night flipped broken worm guards, strung up broken like kiddies.

The City suffered a riot (weeks? days?), the Trooper is reading a newspaper in a deserted bar. The Arbities/police were called in and attacked.

Uptown sprayed with gutters by methadone commune.

The riots went citywide, the well off attacked by addicts to the idea of the City.

Burnt torn gutter night. Spent, churn out into a pity. Not serenity. Ghetto taking graphed girlfriends, her into a flamethrower.

Describes the scenes. The  riots burned themselves out after a time, but everthing has been trashed and there is still no peace. The Trooper may have lost someone he knew or loved, a civil servant, killed by either side. The ghetto took her, though that is ambiguous. She may have been killed in the riot, died fighting on either side or was living there when it was torched. Hardly matters now, she's dead.

No disturbing the necropolis, addicts to the metropolis.

The City is a tomb, there can be no escape from society. Anarchic street crime (addict to the metropolis) only adds to this society and in tearing it down, they open the Tomb.

Irons clubbed, the hands of pity, he remains in the City.

The government is no better, the hands meant to bring peace and justice, battering innocent and guilty alike. But still the Trooper remains, he has nowhere else to go, and, perhaps, he does not want to leave. Maybe he loves the City more than the people.

Snores in a shut wake,

Is he bored by it all? Is he in the coffin, asleep, bored to death by 'civilised' commercial culture? Maybe he wants the riot.

no pity for a walled Committee. Who will thirst in the pit, spending the death time trying to get out of it?

Distrusts the government, and society at large for crushing inherently hopeful individuals who have no chance of escape.

Hope that helps, though it's not exactly profound.

Ah yeah, have youse read the end of 'The Commissar is a Man of Action' yet? It's damn good stuff.

[Bronze]

I like this. It is a series of fragments, but the fragments themselves have enough coherence in them for the reader's mind to begin to form images, and even get to know characters. I have found some of your other work too fragmented to engage with; I can see what you are trying to do but, whereas with this piece you form an image then break it, with some others the image does not even get a chance to form, and the reader is left in confusion. It is that fine line between communicating a character's confusion to the reader (without hitting us over the head with "Roy was Confused"), and confusing the reader themselves. My feeling is that you need to stay with each image or idea a little longer, as you do here or in the second part of 'man of action'. However, here in particular the reader can understand and engage with the Trooper and his predicament (even though his predicament is not entirely clear, that is OK because it is probably not entirely clear to him either!), can see through his eyes and empathise with him. With 'Man of Action' the first part does not give a coherent sense of Roy as a character; I feel the story would be stronger if we were able to identify with him a little more so that there would be more of a tension when you alienate him from us so violently in the second part (as it is he just looks like he has a bad case of nasty-person syndrome).
Sorry to comment on two stories in one post, but I thought the comparison made it easier to understand what I meant. Keep it up - you do a good job with a difficult technique and when it works it for you it works really well.

cheers

Bronze

[Onanon]

However, here in particular the reader can understand and engage with the Trooper and his predicament (even though his predicament is not entirely clear, that is OK because it is probably not entirely clear to him either!), can see through his eyes and empathise with him.

Nice way of putting it alright!

I have found some of your other work too fragmented to engage with; I can see what you are trying to do but, whereas with this piece you form an image then break it, with some others the image does not even get a chance to form, and the reader is left in confusion.

I get that quite a lot, but I'm unsure how one makes a story more coherent without really spelling it out. Or maybe I should? Anyway, as I've said, I'll put more body into it.

I like this. It is a series of fragments, but the fragments themselves have enough coherence in them for the reader's mind to begin to form images, and even get to know characters.

I suppose it is like a mirror, with each fragment reflecting a whole. It's something strange and beautiful, but still undeniably broken. It was meant to get the point across quickly and be direct yet elusive. I'm glad you like it.

With 'Man of Action' the first part does not give a coherent sense of Roy as a character; I feel the story would be stronger if we were able to identify with him a little more so that there would be more of a tension when you alienate him from us so violently in the second part (as it is he just looks like he has a bad case of nasty-person syndrome).

Yeah... that first part is a problem. Did you read the first 'Commissar'?
That was meant to be the empathy chapter, to develop the character. The Culexus interruption of a Mind War split his psyche into fragments, and the first story deals with him collecting up the pieces. Bits of him are still human, haven't been ground out by brutality. The very last part of the second 'Commissar' story was meant to show the greater evil that Roy just cannot contain.

More empathy, got it.

Thanks for the unified criticism, it helps a lot with the writing.

[Bronze]

I'm unsure how one makes a story more coherent without really spelling it out. Or maybe I should? 

No, don't spell out any more than you have to. The real strength of your writing is the way you show rather than tell, especially using your sentence structure to reflect the state of mind of the characters, and their actions to illustrate their motivations. Don't drop into description - as I said, "Roy was confused" is just clumsy and an illustration is so much more effective. Keep with your style - as I said when it works it works really well. You make the reader do some work, but reward them for it, which is a rare thing to find. Maybe just make the fragments of your mirror a bit bigger?

When you have all these done, can you post links to all the stories in this cycle? I think that reading them all together might help put the fragments together.

Cheers

Bronze

[Onanon]

But it puts people off, having to do a bit of work. Still... it's good to work on a style, and to have that style come naturally to me (and be halfway decent, even better!)

When you have all these done, can you post links to all the stories in this cycle? I think that reading them all together might help put the fragments together.

Will do, but it's an ever expanding circle. I think the Anomie Cycle is done (The Trooper, Clean and Still) bar some unused characters and stories and ideas yet to be worked in somewhere. I feel it still needs something overarching and grander, a grand unification project as it were.
Perhaps some awesome warpronz, with 10 divisions of PDF, Anomien splinter battalions and a few allied Ortegan heroes, those MEN OF MEN, FIGHTING TO DIE, THOSE BRAVE FEW, STANDING UP FOR THE WEAK AND HELPLESS. MANLY TEARS would flow freely, for a man's way of LIFE AND DEATH.

See? It practically writes itself.
And sorry *cough*... I get carried away like that.

The Colony cycle is yet to be finished (2-3 stories left in that, plus another 3 if I want to)
and from there is another cycle of maybe 3 or 4. That's when the amphetamine parrot starts to go down, with the pew-pew and BOOM! COVERING FIRRRREEE!!one!. Needless to say, something big is going to happen.

Aaaaand that's only the beginning. This is the start of the Nihil Rifles story, we'll take the fight to the universe at large from here on in. I haven't even touched the past of the regiment, the so-called '0th' as there is basically nothing left of them anymore.

Original fluff is here , most of it stands, though the homeworld is wiped by Chaos insurrection now. I might do a rewrite of it someday soon. Anyway, 'As It Should Be' is due to start tomorrow, looking foward to getting stuck into Mono.

Cheers, and peace.

-NLL-
Should I sign it? So hard to say!

EDIT: I just thought out the entire thing while making a cup of tea!
Typical quote: 'We've lost everything... WE HAVE NOTHING LEFT TO LOSE!
CHAAAARGE!!!

It ends with twelve of them, manning the wall. The ships have all left the space port, most of them wiped out by the orbiting Chaos fleet and a colossal dust cloud is seen on the horizon, maybe a billion tanks, daemons and unthinkable horrors.
The Long Fellow, a Red Branch (think Irish/Russian alliance) rifleman is sitting, holding his lasgun. He looks into the distance and says the the remaining 11.

'We'll hold out, go deo na naire, 'till the end of tears.'

Made of so much win and awesome.