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Old June 12, 2003, 19:45   #1
SKILORD
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The Final Sting
Inspired by a magnificent modpack, Atlas and the Kraken by RagnarD.

-

Copenhagen was a free city. A feat in this era of domination, where the closest other independent city was St. Petersburg, Catherine’s last refuge, which sat on the free side of the Caspian.

Ragnar lived in Copenhagen, but he didn’t matter much to Olaf. Ragnar was as good as dead to the world’s purpose of history. History was written by the victors, which left the humbled Germans, Russians, and Vikings victims to the Pole’s pens as well as their swords.

Olaf liked the city, he realized as he limped through the icy streets. He had lost the use of his leg to a Hussair’s horse while fighting outside Oslo. His antiquated spear was mounted in his warm little hut. Men who still bore the spear for Ragnar’s sake walked proudly, they could not remember the days past, they had quickly forgotten the humiliating treaty that their great leader had signed himself.

“Is the boat ready?”

The mate nodded sharply, Olaf smiled back, slapping his hand against his first mate’s shoulder, “Good work.”

If he lived in Poland Olaf, the Red bandit, as seamen knew him, would have been brought to justice long ago. As it was he had almost been caught on several occasions, but somehow his longboat, a relic of days past, managed to outrun even the fastest Polish cutter.

Mist was content in the Viking’s final haven, the sleepy dew was slow to part before the dragon adorned mast as Olaf pushed his ship faithfully out to sea, listening to the straining rowers behind him, shooting his long broken nose and lengthy graying beard into the misty future.

-

Olaf looked off the mast onto the Rocky shore, Ice kissed the rocks further in, but the salt vanquished it when it neared the ocean. It was apparent who would win the match; the Ice could never progress, leaving it at the mercy of the sea. Isn’t that how it goes, Olaf pondered.

“The Red bandit?” the man spoke Norse with a thick English accent.

Olaf grimaced, holding up his axe, “Aye.”

The other man smiled and turned to his colleagues to speak in the supposedly refined language of his native island. He turned from his colleagues, leaving a grin to each of them.

“We have something we would like you to do.”

“Is the gold good?”

“Pure,” The Angle assured him.

“To what purpose?”

“Against the Poles.”

Struggling into English Olaf replied, “I do this for free.”

A look of mild amazement passed between the islanders before they returned to the Norseman.

“What’s the job?”

“We need you to lead an army.”

“It’s suicide.”

“I promise you, we shall win.”

“Then you wish me dead?”

With a self-assured gaunt an Englishman who had been silent before walked up and presented himself to the crew.

“You shall live, and you shall vanquish,” the foreigner promised.

Olaf looked out into the mist, realizing that he had nothing left but war, seeing that his nation could do no better than to stand tall in all it’s shattered glory he turned back to the Angle.

“Aye. It will be done.”

-

Looking into the crowd of men Olaf was finally assured of his death. He couldn’t bear to promise himself another month of air when he looked into that pitiful army and imagined them dying against the Poles.

“Would it not be better to leave them to their families?”

The Englishman shook his head, “We can do it, my friend, they need some training, but all of your crew have fought before and it will be easy.”

“It is easy to fall upon a spear. Defeat is a simple task, nothing of glory knows ease as it’s medium.”

The Angle shook head, looking amused at the Viking, “There will be a day when even Krakow, Warsaw and even Moscow shudder before this army.”

“Yes, but by then we will all certainly be dead.”

The Angle smiled back, “Smartass.”

-

Spears warbled in the hands of the motley army of Germans, Vikings and even a few Russians from long destroyed Kiev. Men older than Olaf stood in the ranks, men younger than his sons, whom he had never met, but whose ages he estimated at about sixteen, next to them, each held a crude weapon.

Each had been trained in it, all knew the basics of spear bearing, but was it enough?

“Munich lies right about,” the guide, a short, stocky German, pointed, “There. A week’s march.”

Olaf nodded, lifting his axe, the men marched as they had been commanded, following his axe, Olaf’s bad leg hung limp from the side of his golden northern pony, pain began to pursue him, a hunt which would last the journey, Riding was hard, but harder still was the walk.

-

Spears floated through the air in their ballet of death, the men were trained, the hearts were free of the oppression of living in Polish cities, the wilderness offered it’s own independence, it’s own defiance to Kazmir’s will. It was unconquerable, as were all true hearts, as were all the men who dared to declare themselves so.

The men who marched behind him were such men, such brave souls who refused surrender, even to such an enemy as the Poles. He was proud of them, he would be proud to die with such men, rather than the cowards in Viking form, Ragnar and his legions of bravado.

He wished he could tell them such, wished he could stand to ach of them and tell them in the face that they were brave, and that he envied their strength of purpose. But he knew that battle would come, that he must save what remained of his strength.

“We march on the city tomorrow,” the Angle declared.

“It wouldn’t be wise,” he looked with a sneer at the Englishman and added as an afterthought, “Sir.”

“I don’t care. The men are ready in my estimate.”

“Have you ever battled the Hussair’s? Have you? I did, I almost died against them, and I was fully trained, armed with the best an entire nation could provide. We have a ragtag force. It is suicide.”

“You said that about this entire idea, but a few clever words turned your heart quickly. Shall I call Winston to realign your purpose?”

“I shall fight, but only for this; I have nothing left to live for. Nothing save to face battle once more and humbly proclaim my defeat. Do not damn the survivors to what has been my troubled fate, and do not condemn the rest of us to what that fate will be.”

“We march,” if anything the Angle was ironed in his demand now, “Tomorrow.”

-

The Mist returned, no stranger to the Finnish town. The hills were silent, watching the quiet men, assured of victory and yet foreboding, march across their neighbors. Destiny awaited. The reaper’s scythe was polished for it’s bloody harvest.

Looking into the Mist Olaf realized that he had a new army under his command, one whose power was so great that it could shake even Warsaw and Krakow, but it could not be used like this, they had to turn to the forest, hide and strike, he turned to the Englishmen, the words on the tip of his tongue. They grinned idealistically, the final optimists.

As the walled city, grew in their sights the army took up its weapons, as the horses appeared in the distance the blood in Olaf’s veins trembled and froze. The wings were apparent.

Hussair’s; winged cavalry, their ornate decoration and weapons were soon visible. Olaf, a hardened Viking pirate, wept with fear.

“So be it,” he turned to the Angles, his tears barely dry, “I wash my hands of your fate.”

The Angles still smiled, “Let it be so.”

The Poles charged, the spears were dug in as the men had been shown.

With a cry Olaf slapped his horse, pushing it forward, swinging his axe into the Polish army. He was lost for a while, swinging without control or worry, his mind lost in the eternity of battle. Quiet came, as it is wont to do as the storm passes directly overhead. Olaf found the Angles, their throats slit with a neatness that the Hussairs would never have managed.

Cowards.

Olaf heard a horse, the noise different for the weight in armor that the beast must bear, he turned to the sound.

The Pole’s sword was already lifted, Olaf realized he had no hope, and that his army was already vanquished.

And as his blood began it’s final flow Olaf forgot the pain, it was outweighed so heavily by the final thing that he would feel, and the pain which did more towards killing him than the Hussair’s lightning swing.

The final sting of Remorse.

--

And so I ask you, who was the bigger coward?

Last edited by SKILORD; June 12, 2003 at 21:22.
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Old June 12, 2003, 19:53   #2
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I know Coppenhagen isn't really a port city, bear with me if you need an explaination, he set off from the fort.
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Old June 12, 2003, 20:51   #3
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Sorry its so short, and sorry about any quality problems I just threw it together.
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Old June 13, 2003, 08:01   #4
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As usual you put a lot of effort into trying to sound flowery with your writing style. You should be careful with overdoing the flowery effect because for readers like me who prefer a more straight-laced style, it comes off as very awkward sometimes. One example is when the rowers were "shooting" his nose through the mist. I admit I read fairly fast but even after 2 reads of that line I still had an image of the rowers firing his nose out of gun into the mist. I understood it the 3rd time I read it.

I know you are trying to develop a shakespearean effect to your writing which is fine if that's the style you like best. My point is that I hope you will avoid sounding like you're trying too hard to write like someone else. It's no replacement for creativity.

Dang I'm critical I'm busy cooking-up a potfull of chicken & veggie curry while writing this so maybe that's a reason for it.
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Old June 13, 2003, 23:49   #5
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Well, I can criticise too.

I won't complain about my style, since it is my perfered style, but here:

I need sommat between the marching segments, some training bits, perhaps introduce a new character, a common soldier to whom Olaf becomes attached to and to whom he witnesses the death of, in order to cement the charachter's development. I should also make the Millitia's defeat clearer.

Quote:
My point is that I hope you will avoid sounding like you're trying too hard to write like someone else. It's no replacement for creativity.
I contend that I am not attempting to make this the style of someone else, but I will certainly try to make it more understandable, you raise valid points here.
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Old June 14, 2003, 04:36   #6
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One complaint is why so short, the other is you used the phrase," Smartass" in a story otherwise without American style slang and I felt that it did not fit properly with the rest of the piece.

I did enjoy reading it and I like your writing style.
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Old June 14, 2003, 15:02   #7
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SKI, I like this. But I think you definitely can do better, as you have shown in the past. I kind of agree with scratch - some of the sentences were a little over-board. It's not that they are not understandable, just that they seem a little too much on the flowery side, to repeat scratch.

It could be just me, but the sentence I particulalry disliked was this one: "Spears floated through the air in their ballet of death" I think it is a perfect example of the little awkward things in this piece. I mean, floating, in my mind, brings up something slow and relaxed. Like a water lily floating on the surface of a pond. Whereas spears always bring up the associations of something fast and furious. Otherwise they wouldn't be deadly, now would they? They zoom by to pierce the heart of your comrade. Even if you can't see them, you can hear them. Definitely not a floating type of sound. The one situation I think this may have been appropriate is if you are going for the sort of time slow-down effect. Like seeing the battle through the eyes of a soldier. He can hear his heart beat. He sees everything in a kind of slow motion: the feet of the men who refuse to surrender stomping the ground, the eyes of the boys going into the battle, the spears floating in a deadly ballet...

I am not sure I explained this very well, but I hope you see what I mean.

The one thing I don't agree with scratch about is that you are trying to use the style as a replacement for creativity. I quite like the plot and don't think the story lacks anything in that respect. (Well, it being so short might be quoted as a shortcoming, but I think for its length it's got a good plot.)
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Old June 14, 2003, 15:18   #8
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I too dont agree that this is not creative, in fact I think its very creative and just another step in your development as a writer and in your experiments with writing styles.

Vovan you have well summed up this piece, its good to see you back and posting friend.

More power to your elbow SKILORD
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Old June 14, 2003, 18:33   #9
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Quote:
Originally posted by ChrisiusMaximus
its good to see you back and posting friend.
Thanks, Chris. I am not sure I will be able to read the stories here regularly, though, much less write anything on my own, as the free time I have is kind of limited and erratic. I'll try though.
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Old June 14, 2003, 19:20   #10
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Thnx Vovan, I see what you mean about the awkward descriptions, there are other people who see that as both my greatest failing and at other points my greatest potential, as it can sometimes be quite thought provoking. I do tend to misuse it, as the gently floating spears demonstrates, I'm working on controlling it.

Yes, the brevity is a failing as well. I admit this.
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