The Attempt to Go Back

When This World was new, and while Jupiter and The Six helped to establish the survivors from the First World in it, there were those he could not settle, who sought to rebuild all they had lost.

This group, many of whom had been hedonistic Helios hangers-on, left to build a new tower. They began by trying to locate the stones of the tower that was but Mother had buried them when she lay down and became the earth.  

To the forest they turned and began to fell it, beginning the construction of a New World large enough to house the survivors as well as the Tree of Life, a small party having gone in search of it.

Jupiter often visited, seeing both hope (for a grand shelter) and doom (for it could never be what they wanted) in the project, hoping to make the builders see it as he did, as it truly was; but they would not do so.

Neither could, or would, they foresee their eventual defeat- for you cannot recapture what has passed, to go back and undo the past.  The future is the only place one can go, can seek, can plan for.

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Written for Flash! Friday from the following picture prompt and including the required theme of Defeat.

Construction of the Statue of Liberty’s Pedestal. CC2.0 photo by National Parks Service, Statue of Liberty ca 1875.

Man vs his own nature; or Too much coffee today to think properly right now?; or just “Man” vs Nature

“Freeze it,” she suggested, “It’s the only way, surely.  That’s how we conquered Scan...”

No...

“These things are sent to try us.  All you can do is freeze it,” she suggested.  “It’s the only way, surely.  It’s what we did in the north, we can do it here.”

No.

“These things are sent to try us, Alan, all we have to do is freeze it.  What other way is there?”

NO!

I got uncomfortable with my own idea; it felt too colonial, too oppressive.  Even setting it away from Africa in a fantasy world still wouldn’t sit right with me.

Freezing a waterfall in Africa to defeat a local tribe (or Nature herself?)?  I mean, please.

And with magic, it’s too easy.  Almost-anti-nature vs earth wizards doesn’t fit well here, either.

Yet…

At the start of things, “Man” and Nature were pitted against one another in a struggle to see who would dominate the other across time.

Challenged to climb a great waterfall, “Man” looked across the ages to see the tools at “his” disposal.  Seeing how differently humans and nature would evolve “he” smiled, produced a device to freeze the waterfall, and clambered up it.

Seeing his shortsightedness, Nature smiled, conceded defeat and looked to the long game.

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Written for Flash! Friday from the following picture prompt and including the required story element of Conflict: Man vs Nature.

Victoria Falls. CC2.0 photo by Tee La Rosa.

The Man in the Car Park

It was the first multi-storey car park outside the M25, you know.  Not the sort of place I’d have expected something like this to happen. 

He was either in fancy dress (standard or cosplay) or a time traveller.  A medieval Japanese archer is, I guess, how you’d describe him. 

It was the way that he was kneeling that caught my attention.  It reminded me of the start of the film, 13 Assassins, and I began to worry I was about to witness a ritualistic suicide.  I didn’t want to take my eyes off the scene, to miss the drawing of the blade, to be able to shout as loud as I could but I was in an office block across the street.  The only realistic chance I had of stopping him was to run.

And run I did- like the wind, like the wolf in Princess Mononoke- out her office, down the stairs, out the door, into the street… where I stopped dead.  Our man was leaving the car park with a Geisha, hand in hand.

Still.  It stopped me from shagging my boss.  On the walk back to the party I re-thought the whole thing. 

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Written for Flash! Friday from the following picture prompt and including the setting of a parking lot (or car park as we call them over here).

 

Night Archer. CC2.0 photo by Tanakawho.

His Last Daydream

There’s a story about a man who stole a look and was given a strange punishment, a story Andrew thought about every time he’d crossed the square to work.

This time, as was usually the case, Andrew found himself imagining how it would’ve looked that fateful day as the man had casually made his way.

In his mind’s eye Andrew saw, superimposed upon the modern scene, all the trappings of its former self from the muck strewn ground, to the old town hall and stalls of all kinds.

It became more real as he walked, the sounds and smells appearing too, until Andrew imagined the cart as it approached and, as it drew alongside, he thought about what, if he’d really existed, that poor man might have seen.

In an instant he was there, Andrew left the dream and entered reality.  The cart was in his peripheral vision, its occupant reaching down to adjust a shoe.  Out of curiosity, Andrew turned and saw too much.

A voice whispered, “Thank you,” another condemned him and Andrew found himself cursed to ever walk across the square, resetting as he reached the far side back to the first.  Always he must walk, always with his head firmly down.

Until another imagined strongly enough.

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Written for Flash! Friday: the prompts were the following picture and the required story element of a fleeting moment.

 

Rain (Liberia, Guanacaste, Costa Rica). CC2.0 photo by NannyDaddy.

Return to the Days Before

She bought the flower stickers because they remind her of the time before the dragons came, blowing the beach to glass, the land to ashes.  The flowers she knew from her adolescence, and are a way to take her mind, at least, back. 

She was on the beach when they arrived.  Not the hottest day, but dry and bright with only the slightest breeze.  Her circle of friends had normally loved to find a little crater in the dunes to make their own.  The beauty of the day had probably saved them then, as they’d had no need for shelter from sun or wind. 

Instead, they’d sat atop the dunes and gained a good view of the approaching storm that had been forecast only by rumour; and a wonderful view of the first bursts of fire emanating from it. 

They felt the heat, heard the screams. 

And ran.

They, ran, then cycled, home, ignoring every sight on the way, intent only on getting far enough away.

She served as a dragonslayer after, has seen too much for one lifetime.  Left tired but victorious, she seeks ways to link up with the before time we are trying to restore the world to.  Her bicycle and those stickers are her latest attempt.

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Written for Flash! Friday - the challenge was to use the setting of a Beach along with the following picture prompt:

 

Old Woman. CC2.0 photo by Giorgio Grande.