Lee's Island, Part 7

(The first part of my oldest fan fiction can be found here.)

In which exclamation points cannot possibly be overused and Naruto thinks he's really funny.

Also, happy (American) Pi Day!

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Sakura yawned. It was morning at last, and she had just now woken up. It didn't take long for her to notice that Lee wasn't there. She got out of the tent and stared at what Lee had worked on all night.

It was another hut, though nowhere near as shabby. Lee had cut down a lot of trees and made a log cabin! Sakura walked up to it and looked inside. It had a main room and four lofts for sleeping. The ground was covered up with strips of bark that were somehow connected. There were a couple of wooden chairs covered with cushy leaves. There was even a pile of firewood, neatly stacked into a pyramid, to use to cook meals. Sakura was amazed. She then looked more carefully at the lofts and saw Lee sleeping on his leaf, which he had brought with him. Sakura was about to say, "Wow, Lee, this is amazing!", but she thought he had done all this hard work and should have some rest. She went back outside, where the sun was shining brightly, and kunaied some fish for breakfast. 

"Time for breakfast, everyone!" she said. The fish were completely finished, and Sakura had even added some spices, edible of course, to their meal. "I'm up, I'm up," Naruto mumbled. He was still on his leaf. Finally, he got up. He walked out of the tent and gaped at the cabin.

"What the heck is this?!" He walked over to the leafy door where Sakura was with the fish. "Neat, isn't it?" she said. "Lee made it overnight." Naruto's jaw nearly dropped to the ground. "Seriously?!"

"That's what it looks like. He's still asleep, on that loft right there." Naruto bended over and grabbed a fish. "Huh. Hey, this is good fish! What'd you do?" Naruto grabbed another when he finished.

"I put some spices I made in it. Hey, leave some for Lee!"

"Hey, you snooze, you lose!" Naruto rolled around laughing. "Get it? Snooze? Because he's asleep?" Naruto kept on laughing. "Come on! Get it? Get it? Get it? Get it get it get it?" Sakura sighed. "I get it perfectly well, Naruto. It's just not very funny." Naruto stopped laughing and moaned. TenTen arrived. "Wow, who did all this?"

"Lee. He's asleep up there now."

"Huh." TenTen sat down and started eating her breakfast. "Hey, Sakura," she said, munching, "what'd you put in here? It's better than the ones I made."

"Oh, nothing really. I just thought to make some spices for it, and I found suitable materials on the island."

Eventually, Rock Lee woke up. "Hey, everybody," he said drowsily. "Do you like it?"

"Like it, no. I love it! It's so much better than that poor excuse for a hut we slept in last night!"

"Thanks," Lee said. "Time for breakfast, I guess?"

"If you want some," Sakura said. 

"I am pretty hungry," he replied. "Why not?" He grabbed a fish and chomped down on it. "These are the best yet! Sakura, did you cook these?"

"What do you mean by that?!" TenTen yelled. 

"Uh, nothing?"

"You'd better mean nothing!" Sakura and Naruto started laughing, and eventually, so did TenTen and Lee. 

"Ugh. I do not feel so good all of a sudden," Lee said, sitting down.

"Must not be the fish. I feel fine."

"Maybe you should go back to sleep. You did stay up all night building this."

"It did not take all night, but I do feel a little sleepy. Why not?" Jaws dropped. "It didn't even take you all night?!"

"No," Lee said, climbing up to his loft, "It was still dark when I finished. I am going to go ahead and take a nap." He set himself down on his leaf and was soon snoring. You'd think he would wake himself up snoring that loud! Cha! Sakura thought.

"Okay, I'm finished. How about you guys?"

"I'm pretty much done, too. How about you, Naruto?"

"Well, we ran out of fish." Sakura stared dumbfounded at the now-empty bark bowl. "So, yeah, I guess I'm good."

"What should we do now?"

"How about target practice?" TenTen replied. "No way!" Naruto yelled. "That's boring!"

"Naruto! Shush! Lee's asleep, remember?"

"It's hard to forget," Naruto mumbled, "when he snores that loud."

"Grrrrr..." Sakura growled. "Wait a sec. Did anyone else hear something?"

"I didn't," TenTen replied. Suddenly, a figure rushed out of the brush, pouncing on Sakura.

"Sakura!"

It was the leopard. Sakura, along with the big cat, was tumbling across the grassier area of the island. TenTen and Naruto sprinted after them. Sakura's shrieks of pain were somehow not enough to wake Lee up. Soon, the cat and Sakura stopped rolling. Naruto ran and yanked the leopard off of Sakura. He gaped at the many claw wounds Sakura now had. Without premonition, the cat turned in Naruto's grasp and pounced on him. The boy screamed, claws digging into his skin. Naruto struggled, attempting to pull the leopard off of him, when suddenly, it fell limp. Panting, he looked at the cat. A kunai had struck it in the heart. Naruto threw its body to the ocean.

"What happened?"

"It attacked you, so I threw a kunai at it."

"Oh, okay. Thanks, TenTen."

"No problem. Is Sakura okay?"

"I don't know." TenTen sighed. "Here, I'll check her pulse." TenTen knelt down and did so. "She's fine," TenTen said, "but we need to doctor her so she won't get an infection. Do you have any bandages?"

"Nope. You?"

"None here. Do you think Lee might have some to spare?"

"Yeah, if we can wake him up!" Naruto started laughing.

"Okay, help me carry her back to camp." TenTen and Naruto picked Sakura up and headed to the cabin.

New Fan Fiction Idea #25

This isn't actually a new idea, and I don't have any intention of writing it myself, but, hey, here it is if anyone else is interested.

Working Title: "Sunset"

Fandom: Axis Powers: Hetalia

Genre Tags: Angst/General

Length: Oneshot.

Protagonist: England.

Other Main Characters: Possibly none.

Antagonist: Possibly none.

Plot: "If the sun never sets, then why is it so, so close to the horizon now?" England reflecting on the impending loss of the empire.

Setting: Outside at his home, at the appropriate time.

Point of View: First person (England).

Prompt Writing #6

A shorter one, it seems.

Prompt: [Forward Motion Writers generator]

"Where would your character hide if they needed to disappear? Where could they blend into the crowd and, hopefully, vanish in plain sight?

Today, give your character a reason to hide, and then help them find a way to go underground until the storm blows over.

If they can."

Randomly Selected Story and Characters: Mount, Dobson and Crick

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

It didn't take their genius IQs to recognise that there was a problem. As a matter of fact, even Theodore and his sister seemed concerned.

Granted, several tribesmen were readying their spears with no targets but the railroaders in sight.

Supposing that that carving Theodore took was quite important to the natives.

Dobson and Crick were currently bringing up the lead in the fleeing party, despite the latter's short legs. The luxury expandable shelters were far too soft to be proper cover; the single railroad car was solid if relatively lightweight, but there were too many windows. The rock face ahead—the actual start point of the mission—was, however, considerably solid. 

It was also considerably distant.

The engineers forged ahead regardless. There were few trees and other obstacles on the way, and, while there was no hope of tripping up their pursuers, there was little risk of tripping up themselves. 

The spears, at least, seemed to be a mere threat rather than, well, a threat. Surely natives that hunted animals were capable of throwing spears at moving targets. They were merely trying to frighten the railroadmen into returning the artifact.

Shame that Theodore had already sent it back to his home.

It was a wooden relief, not particularly large, from one of the trees that were the predominant type in this area. A good number even crept up the side of the mountain.

Surely it would be a simple matter to replicate. With the engineers' attention to detail, they could recall every swipe of the blade that created the medicine man's profile. As long as they could shelter in a spot of the mountain for a while, they could resurface with the "artifact," hand it over, and go on their way. Of course, they would need supplies. And most likely their benefactors out of the way or, even better, as a distraction.

No problem. If anyone could orchestrate such a complex cover-up, it was Dobson and Crick, the genius engineers of their century.

As long as they could outrun the natives first.

New Fiction Idea #46

This one isn't very well-developed yet, but it's worth throwing out there.

Working Title: Witchlet

Genre: Fantasy

Protagonist: Antheia, a centuries-old witch who appears to be somewhere in her twenties or early thirties. She has dark red hair that hangs straight to her shoulder blades. Her face is angular, and she's more thin than skinny, although she's still fairly attractive. She doesn't have a tendency to take most things seriously despite her severe cynicism, and her playful side is quite malicious. As a child, she was much more quavering and afraid to hurt others.

Other Main Characters: In flashbacks, the other main character is Antheia's older brother Lazarus. He was tall, blonde, and fairly well-built, and he sacrificed a lot of his personal life to take care of his sister.
In present day, Antheia's only company is her coworkers at the business firm and her tabby cat Samantha.

Antagonist: Phillip, a young man with brown skin and dark, medium-length hair. A bit naiive, he enjoys climbing and works as a mechanic. He's under the impression that Antheia saved his life once before, and he's determined to pay her back somehow.

Setting: Massachusetts. The flashbacks are mostly during a witch hunt, and the other story is moder-day.

Plot: In the frequent flashbacks, a 7-year-old Antheia (who has been cursed with witchhood but has not made an actual pact with the devil) struggles not to be found out for what she is. Lazarus is her main protector.
In present day, Antheia goes about her business until Phillip finds her out. She does her best to throw him off the trail, but he's determined to reach out to her.

Point of View: Third person, limited to Antheia.

From Me to You

People always seem to think that writing should be for the writer's sake, and that the writer should be happy with the work regardless of what others think of it. That's right... to a point. Of course, there's striving for quality, which really can't be done by one's self, but that's not the only reason to share one's work.

I think it's important—maybe even more so—to let others enjoy it.

Now, to some extent, I do have a need to write every once in a while. Once I spend time beyond that on a story, though, what is it for? Maybe it's not necessarily wrong to just write a lot for my own enjoyment, but, when I think about it... Isn't it a little bit selfish? If it's exclusively about what I want, and I'm putting tons of my time and resources (and maybe even some others') into it just to have fun myself, wouldn't that seem a little self-centered? I could be spending that time helping people, or at least hanging out with them so the enjoyment is shared.

So I kind of feel obligated to share my writing. In my case, this is hardly a burden; in fact, I have trouble writing most things without some friends' feedback along the way. But that's not the case for every writer and every story, and I think we have a responsibility to let other readers in on the fun. Maybe it's just a silly story, and maybe it's more than rough around the edges, but someone out there could really enjoy it or even learn from it (whether that be a life lesson or just some material for mnemonics). And who am I to keep that from them?

I might have a weird way of looking at things, but how about you? Do you think a writer is obligated to share? Only under certain circumstances?

Fragments VIII

Insert a witty seven word phrase here

• A character with Redd White's speech pattern (it's ridiculously fun to write, although it takes a lot of thesaurus time)
• A character with a severed corpus collosum
• An REM behaviour disorder episode or two being a major plot point
• Someone trying to repay a large, literal debt in an interesting fashion
• A video game storyline
• The one fellow from school who is always wearing headphones and singing along loudly to music regardless of where he is or who else is present (he also has a girlfriend who isn't much taller than her guitar)
• The protagonist has actually set up the entire injustice behind his/her quest just for the chance to actually save someone in a significant way
• The phrase "sugar and brain juice" in reference to what's being burned in a mental effort (said by a test prep speaker at the health sciences club)
• More butlers
• A magic user who has to permanently fuse one of his joints with every spell

Dream Journal #18

Been a while, eh?

14 Feb—15 Feb

I had driven myself out to a shopping centre type of building. First I went to dinner at an excessively British restaurant with waiters that would hover over me and even sit at the empty chair across from me. They had some sort of fried cheese curd appetiser that I ordered and, after finding nothing satisfactory on the menu, I ordered fish and chips. I ended up eating the appetiser with the nosy waiter, who vehemently corrected me when I tried to refer to it as anything other than "curds of cheese."

After that, I went next door to a nail salon. The lobby was a wide open space with a large, three-sided counter behind which the receptionists stood. No nail stations were in sight, but there were a few chairs for waiting in the lobby, and two female, Asian employees were talking to me. I was in a bit of a rush so I wouldn't have to drive back in the dark, but whatever we were doing took an extremely long time. At one point, one of the girls held up a very shiny, large, golden key that was attached via a sparkling rope to something that looked like a square pocket. She said it brought up memories and guessed which movie it was in (a movie in which both I and the other worker had starred), but in fact it was from a different movie with us in it.

When I was finally finished, it was 10:00 at night, and I was extremely distressed about this. But when I stepped outside, it was still bright as day. I was extremely confused. Getting in my car, I backed up into another parking spot (I had been in one at the curb).

I came back to the parking lot a bit later to find some adults leading quite a few costumed children through the parking lot. I hurried to a large, black pickup with heavily tinted windows that was apparently my car and got inside. In my haste, I had entered the left backseat, and Emily*, who was in the passenger seat waiting, gave me a look. We watched the children as they made their way across the concrete and laughed at some of the clumsy ones.

At that moment, Kasey** was in the driver's seat, and she rolled down her window to holler at the kids. She joked about running them down and got enough of a response to decide to go through with it. Everyone in the car was laughing as the children continued to run, making it to the edge of the concrete, where grass curved up in a bit of a hill. Worried, I yelled at Kasey to not crest the hill, and, once we had made it almost to the top, she let the pickup start sliding back down the hill.

Then I was driving, and suddenly we were on a dirt road. On either side of us were rows of deep green crops in dark soil. We were utterly lost. I came to the abrupt ending of the dirt road before asking the others if they had any idea what direction we were going. I then looked up at my car's compass, which was indeed that of my real car, to find that it read "Y." Knowing that this somehow meant "west" and we wanted to go east, I turned around and drove for a minute before we were back to the car park, at one of the small street-like exits to the main street.

At this point we were clearly no longer in a car, although we still behaved as if we were. As we came up to the intersection with the larger road, I quickly asked the others in the "car" if we were supposed to turn right or not, and I was told that we were. I stopped just before turning and looked over the main road, which was covered in a layer of slush. Just ahead of us were two very tiny traffic cones and a crumpled water bottle in the near lane. A small white electric car drove on by before it got to the spot just ahead of us, at which point the car promptly flipped onto its left side and skidded to the next-nearest lane, where it stayed. Katya***, one of the two girls with me at that point, told me that this was because the stuff in the road was hazardous. Another car crashed in the same spot in a similar fashion before I checked the oncoming traffic and quickly swung my foot out ahead. I kicked the bottle and a good scoop of slush out onto the grass. After quite a few more cars passed, we finally turned right and headed home.

*My roommate. I drive her to church, so it's not unheard of for her to be in my passenger seat.

**An old friend from church and the neighbourhood.

***One of the girls who went to Japan and China with me last summer.