[4 - Bravo] Silver v. Blood

[Kaez]

750-word limit Flash Fiction

The Pertinent Microcosm

[JMDavis ((Silver))]

Anastasia cried out in pain as she was hurled away from sheltering her family. Bones that had held firm for eighty years shattered like broken glass. The cause of the aging matriarch’s assault was a six foot, five inch shadow swathed in multiple links of iron chain. A veil of silvered steel hid the face of the heavily breathing marauder. Over the pained sobs of the elderly woman a voice like a grindstone barked out, “Grain, now.”

The huddle of filthy peasantry stared at the figure of condensed terror, dumbfounded. Too frightened to even go to the wounded cries of their babushka. A snarl of contempt as the sobs continued, the giant drew forth a piece of black iron and polished oak and pulled a trigger. There was a retort of thunder, the hut filled with acrid smoke, and the cries were silenced. A fist-sized hole of red, wet meat was all that was left of the chest and lungs of Anastasia. The chain-swathed terrorist returned the pistol to a brace on his belt, before withdrawing a second and aiming it at the dozen remaining members of the family. “Grain storage, now,” the words were barked out again – the gun ready to drive the point home.

Kazimir stood slowly, joints creaking and popping. He looked at his mother’s brutalized form with tears in his eyes, before looking at the intruder. Those same tears soaked the thick follicles of his drooping mustaches, “I will take you. Just please, no more death.” A slight nod and rustle of chain was the only response as Kazimir donned a thick fur hat, fur coat, and well-tended boots. The splinters of the front door were brushed aside as the limping man lead the looming monster out into the night. The trek was through cold night and light snow.

The storage for the grain was a ramshackle lean-to, hidden in a thicket of trees and built from waste-wood and sealed tight with dried grass and mud. Kazimir released a sigh of resignation, opening the door to the storage. Instantly, he was shoved out of the way as the large man forced his way inside – peering at the grain. It was a pitiful harvest, there might be enough for Kazimir and his family to survive the winter.

The brute turned away, cupping a hand around his veil and calling out into the darkness. Other figures peeled out of the shadows, star light above bathing them in twinkling light and occasionally shrouding them in the darkness of passing marine monsters from the decks above.

The others drew closer, most were covered in the same chainmail as the first invader. Only one was swathed in robes of black and emerald green, lined in thick fur with a hat of fine fur on top of his head. A pudgy face with a thick red beard and mustaches peered out of the collar of his robes. Breath fogged before his face as he smiled politely at Kazimir. “I am Baron-Procurer Petya Volkov of His Eminence Duke Maksim Orlov, I do hope my Chainguard caused no undue problems for your family, my good sir,” the voice was a saccharine, porcine squeal – all nasally and more akin to a weasel.

Kazimir swallowed thickly, the tone of Baron-Procurer Volkov was enough to make him vomit. More than that, he had to swallow his outrage and urge to shout that his mother was dead because of the Chainguard. “No,” he said instead – tongue thick in his mouth, “No problems at all, My Lord-Procurer.”

“Excellent! Now, Rasputin, what have you found for His Eminence?” Baron-Procurer Volkov dismissed Kazimir as swiftly as he recognized him – the peasant already forgotten. A gesture from the large murderer, Rasputin, directed Baron-Procurer Volkov to look inside the lean-to. A muffled tutting and a small sigh, “Take half. We’ll be generous.” He turned away, letting the Chainguard work while consulting a sheet of paper to find who was next.

~~

The imposing forms of Duke Orlov’s Chainguard dropped one-by-one shrieking in imagined torment, whimpering and sobbing. Four figures marched past with all the precision and emotion of a machine while one stood in the midst of the square. She had horn-rimmed glasses on and her hair done-up in a severe bun. She wore a black silk skirt and white blouse, “Duke Orlov, I am here to collect your seasonal tithe. I do trust the Chainshroud of Captain Volodya will cause you no undue problems in this endeavour.” Her words were saccharine death.

[Bloodeye the Bai Ze]

Metal against flesh.

The shining brass casing of the round caught on the rifle’s receiver, the lipped rim tugging against the interrupter as pressure from a thumb pressed on it. The digit applied equal pressure on the projectile in effort to allow it to smoothly descend into the magazine but like a stubborn ass it held firm to the tiny piece of steel. Finally, the ball of the thumb, the thick meaty part of the palm, came down hard and smacked the edge of the round abruptly and angrily. Friction gave under the application of force. With a loud crack, the bullet seated itself correctly on the magazine spring and locked into place in the receiver.

It was older technology than what one could procure of recent build, but much more resilient and simple. Better quality components and a design that seemed almost impossible to comprehend due to its spartan amount of components. Add a round that was somewhat ancient but of a certain powerful countenance against anything and everything it touched, and together it was a formidable pairing.

However, the round didn’t give its position peacefully. The pincher of metal made between the rim of the case and the interrupter caught a small chunk of skin. Upon removal, it tore away painfully. Small drops of blood flecked onto the shiny case, a sacrifice to “the spirit of the gun”.

The bolt handle was struck in an even more violent fashion. The two prongs of the bolt carrier bushwhacked the bullet from behind and slammed it forward into the receiver. It was emphatically anticlimactic compared to the fight before hand. Certain design flaws could be addressed with nothing more than a little force and a liberal application of lubricant. Now all the light that had once shown on the bullet was reduced to nothing more than a pinpoint reflecting along the inside of a well-maintained rifle barrel.

The front and rear sights aligned. A peep in the rear reduced the field of view, but narrowed and sharpened the focus of the shooter. One eye left open stared unblinking on the target. The butt of the rifle sank into a shoulder firmly. Deep breathes in thru the nose and out the mouth calmed an unsteady arm.

In and out.

In and out.

The lone pupil dilated. Muscles in the arms, neck, chest and back went taut in anticipation. The finger on the trigger clenched tightly as its partnering thumb still dripped the occasional crimson. The trigger crept back slowly, ever becoming heavier and heavier as it went. The point was reached where the weight sat on the edge of releasing, the tension felt in not just the finger but in the whole of the hand.

All senses came to a blur. Eyesight greyed at the fringes. Sound muddled. Taste was nonexistent. Smell meant nothing as a final breath was drawn into the lungs. For this one second, the entirety of everything was but a footnote in-

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Click!

The hunter’s face was staunchly still at the sound of the misfire. It was as if he expected a delayed response, like the bullet had suddenly gotten lazy, would realize it had been fired, and come streaking out of the rifle at any moment.

Unfortunately, it didn’t.

Now he watched as the vincheria hind, his target and much anticipated dinner, notified of the hunter’s presence by the loud audible strike of the firing pin against the primer of the round, was leaping away as gracefully as one might have seen it on a nature documentary. It’s furry black and white striped tail and rear were clearly visible. It was the hind’s natural response to danger. A veritable middle finger to its would-be predator as it dashed away to the safety of the treeline.

The hunter just stared longingly at the potential hunk of meat as it escaped and sighed heavily.

“And I really didn’t want to eat cereal tonight.”

Metal against flesh.

Today, for better or worse, flesh had won.

[Matteo ((Taed))]

Silver:

This seemed to sort of miss the point of flash fiction. It was top-heavy, and it wasn't very self-contained. You had this decent lead-in, but the story was all lead-in, without room for anything else, so it felt unbalanced on the back-end.

I do have a soft spot of worldbuilding by throwaway detail, and there were some good examples of that in here. Things like tossing in the reference to "marine monsters in the decks above." That's good. Keep doing that.

And, you know, maybe try something different from the violence route. I feel hypocritical saying that, since a lot of my stuff is fairly action-heavy as well, but it's probably good advice for both of us. Your second round entry was stronger for that, and flash fiction, especially, is probably the wrong place to bring in a story that relies on that kind of conflict. Conflict usually needs room to ferment; the resolution in this story, where the Duke and his evil men get their comeuppance, is so brief that it just feels perfunctory.


Bloodeye:

It was older technology than what one could procure of recent build, but much more resilient

Obviously not that resilient

Click!

The hunter's face was staunchly still at the sound of the misfire

This gun is a piece of shit


I'm worried that you're losing the thread of your setting. Admittedly, I'm probably prone to judging sci-fi (or lack thereof) more harshly than most, but your first two pieces seemed really intent on building this multiracial, post-spaceflight, alt-Western environment, and I'm really not feeling that anymore at all. Not only did this not feel sci-fi anymore, It really didn't feel very Western, either. A hunter with a rifle does not inherently scream old west to me.

The one thing I did like was the reversal of the "metal against flesh" saying. In the first usage, me being me, I assumed it was going to be a reference to some sort of cybernetics. The fact that it then gave way to a simple circumstance of a man trying to make a gadget work, and then yet again to the contest between weapon and prey, was a cool bait and switch. This might sound in odds to my earlier comments, but it actually isn't. In order to play with reader expectations on this level, you need to foster both sides of the setting. There always needs to be a reasonable belief that a situation could be fantastical or mundane, and that belief is slipping fast.


Winner: Silver