Fragments of War

The Western Front

Note: A Word Scrimmage is an event in which participants write or type as fast as they can for a set time limit with the aim of  increasing their writing pace. The text below is the result of a Word Scrimmage exercise and only typos have been edited.

In war and peace, they said and they lied. Alone he struggled to stay alive. His mind wondered off in many lost directions. And he tried hard, he tried hard to remember. She was all he could think of amid the noise, the blasts, the screams of pain, the blood. Her smile was an oasis. He remembered her so well, as if she were there beside him. When they held hands and walked down the apple tree lane at her parents’ villa and kissed by the balcony. And the screams kept interrupting his thoughts, and he ducked and stayed low for a minute while his commander yelled for them to step forward and run and kill. Lost in his thoughts he ignored the order, but someone kicked him on the ribs, and a shout of pain cut the air. She was his; he would never give her up. And they made plans to marry and have children and build a house with an apple tree lane in the garden where cats would roam the shadows. He remembered her smile, her blue eyes and the blood; the screams started getting mixed in the middle of his thoughts. He could not stay focused. He tried to run. His legs gave in every time he stood up, and more kicks to the ribs. He would kill that commander, one day. That commander was stealing her away from him. And the planes flew over their heads. Was he still alive? Were his comrades still alive? Was there any sense in all this? All he wanted was to see her… but his mind was getting confused. The screams, the screams killed her face more and more. He couldn’t remember well. She was starting to be a blur… He panicked. Not her, no, not her. He refused to lose her. Her eyes were grey and he could reach out and would not hold her hand. He reached for an apple and there would be none. The darned boot kicked him one last time on the ribs, but he didn’t move. He is dead, the commander said, dead as he can be. In his hand, he was clutching her photo, her smile and her blue eyes, alive.

Scrimmage 

Airbrush

Forgotten City

Airbrush me a body of coppery feelings.

My leg fell off in metalic kneelings.

Cold, my arm, my leg

Unwhole, anticipated healings.

Writer's Dash

Tempo

Fae Varriale "Wonderlands" LEA6 2012

Larghissimo, he walked down the street.

Grave, determined.

Adagio, with his chin up,

Adagietto, yes.

Andante, when he saw her.

Moderato, when she saw him.

She turned and, allegretto, he walked towards her.

Allegro moderato, his heart pounding.

Allegro, wanting to hold her.

Vivace when she smiled.

That’s the tempo of a heart.

Wirter's Dash

A Learning Path to Seek Wisdom

ImagiLearning Highlands

First there was an intention and ideas were brainstormed. Then a story was written. Finally a film was shot.

Between one end and the other, a growing process that  only made things more and more interesting.

Original Story

 “Seek wisdom,” she whispered, grasping for inspiration. She looked at the fig tree in awe. It was impressive. Would she achieve enlightenment through it? Would a fig fall on her head and… Oh wait, that was an apple! This task became a bit more complicated than she had anticipated. Of all the wise people she could think of, old Marius was the one she would trust entirely. She went over to his place to find a message on the table saying “Find me.” She was very unsettled by the note thinking something wrong might have happened, so decided to go to several places searching for Marius. Some were magical, some were scary. Some were places she would never set foot in had it not been for the will to find her friend. A few hours later, tired of walking, she sat down at a café. The owner walked up to her and handed her a note. “What is this?” she asked. “Your friend left it here for you.” She opened the note and read “Seeking someone is not easy. Seeking something is not easy. Seeking is not easy.” She was puzzled by that note. Of course, it was not easy. Going to places, talking to people, thinking about life, admiring nature, all these could lead to wisdom. Perhaps she didn’t need Marius after all. She decided to go back to Campus and to the fig tree. As she arrived, there was an owl perched on a branch. She sat down and looked at the owl. After a few minutes, the owl asked “Well?” She got startled. Who had talked?! “Up here.” She looked up. “Ahm… I must be hallucinating… I hear voices,” she said. “No, it’s me! How difficult is it to understand. Aren’t you looking for something?” “I am. I am looking for wisdom and for Marius, to be honest.” The owl flapped his wings briefly and said “The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.”  She pondered. Marius never took himself too seriously, true. But he was wise. “Yes, my dear. I am Marius.” The owl flew down to where she was sitting “to be wise is to see beyond the obvious. It is to seek and never give up. You found me. Let us continue this journey together.” She smiled.

The storyboard by London Junkers.

 

Final LnL Square Machinima - "Seek Wisdom".

 This was a project nourished by London Junkers and myself for 
the UWA Machinima Challenge.

For The Good Of The Company

Zenfinity

No one had ever thought about how long it would last. But she knew. It would last a little over a month. And how did she know? Well, she had been through many situations like this before. It was high time for her to just step up to the plate and say her piece. She stood up and raised her hand. Everyone looked at her amazed as she never said anything during those blasted meetings. All she ever did was drink coffee and sip her water. But not this time, she just rose up slowly and started talking when everyone shut up.

“It’s time to do something about this damn situation. We all know it will not change unless we try to act! Action, decision, planning, everything we used to do in a reverse manner. Now it’s chaos. Chaos is not helping the situation.”

Someone interrupted her and asked whether she had any plan up her sleeve and whether it was easy enough to make it happen. How about the resources? How about all the previous plans made with so much effort?

She knew this would not be easy. The old-fashioned faces sitting around the table had gotten used to their comfy little tasks. It would be tough to change things. But she was determined to do it.

“Well,” she started. “It’s no brainer when we say that the company is going down.”

The others looked at one another puzzled.

“It’s no brainer that we are all making this company sink. The clumsiness and the lack of direction will make it sink. What I propose is to restructure all the levels of decision and invert the pyramid. For one, I need a better parking space! No, I was just kidding to lighten up the mood. Now seriously, invert it, what is the newest thing out there? Glowy balls that jump randomly and get teleported home when lost? Old news. We need something new! And that is the teleporter itself!”

“But we don’t have a teleporter,” said someone at the back of the room.

“Do we even need it? We just need to make others believe we do have it! You’ll see a rush to all our products in the anticipation of that teleporter. We can milk this cow for months!”

“I don’t like it,” someone moaned.

“Well, inverted thought, inverted strategy! Who votes for the teleporter action?”

All but one hand was in the air.

“There we go! We are now officially launching a non-existent teleporter as the latest product!”

Scrimmage

:D To anyone reading this blog, forgive the "ego" moment, but it was a lot of fun and without any editing a story did come out of this frenzy! 10 minutes of writing non-stop. The objective is to increase your writing pace and word count. It's a very interesting exercise and certainly a fun way of getting outside of my comfort zone (aka giving free rein to my obsessive inner editor!). For more info on Scrimmage writing, click the link above! I encourage everyone to participate!

Pigment

The film started. A lot of zombies dragging axes through the streets looking for blood, roaming narrow squares and dark alleys. Unexpectedly, in the middle of the film, a kid becomes the center of the plot. He has this strange gift. He is a Pigmenter. He touches people and they turn blue, green, red. Much to the zombies’ puzzlement, he would not run away from them. He would actually run towards them. He would then touch them and turn them… yellow, of all colors. It was pretty obvious that the zombies didn’t like their reputation ruined like that. Why not red? Why yellow? That was a terrible color with all sorts of derogatory innuendos. So, after much discussion among the zombies, a decision was made. They would run away from the Pigmenter instead of after him. And that was a terrible turning point in the history of the zombies. They would certainly have to fight hard to regain their reputation. But that would be for the sequel!

Writer's Dash

Parallel Universe

Fae Varriale LEA Full Sim Series 2012

Countless pawns,

Restless pawns,

Single file, single soul.

Red and white

on a checkered board.

Evolutions, convolutions

Of lifeless revolutions.

Cryptic universe,

Parallel commotion.

It’s time.

Writer's dash

Thumb

Mare Serenitatis

He twiddled his thumbs impatiently. That rule of thumb everyone kept referring to in the local contest was bullocks. “Thumbs down to that,” he thought. As he thumbed through the plants catalog it was pretty obvious; it stuck out like a sore thumb. His green thumb was the envy of the whole village. Yes, he always thumbed his nose at the whole commotion and never accepted to be under anyone’s thumb. So, it was time. He decided to simply thumb a ride out of there and start somewhere else where thumbs would not even be mentioned! 

Thumbs up to that!

100 Word Stories