Sunsets - Thank the Lord for the Night Time by Alicia

Thank the Lord for the Night Time

In the final years of the Old Days, humanity was still in denial. Stargazing in its infancy couldn’t explain it. Patricians couldn’t either. Religion stood up to take the podium, only to step down in dismay as the crowds refused to accept the Gods’ wrath in death and darkness. Cities rose and fell like the breaths of a dormant giant as the heavens realigned. The ozone shifted. Slowly, almost excruciatingly, the western hemisphere boiled and burned away.

The cold nights grew longer. Days fell short. Dawn splashed against the horizon for hours, flickering at noon. Receding into dusk.

Oceans that once flowed learnt to swirl.

In the last moments before a thousand years came to rest, the bauble that was Earth became still.

***

For nearly two millennia, the men and women of the known east grew solemn and pale. 'Days' became the stuff of distant hokum and crazy talk. Civilisations evolved to flourish under the thousand year starlight.

The Old Gods faded fast.

And eventually, so did the New.

As the summery breath of August 1967 receded into the atmosphere of the night, the stars too began to disappear from the night sky. Sirens from the neighbourhood over were going off; car and house alarms startling and screeching as tumbling bodies hurtled from the heavens. Children with telescopes would watch as a twinkle of light was snuffed out by a celestial thumb; a soft pregnant silence, before the telling spark sang way up high in the troposphere, and a path of fire would blaze to life.

One by one, they fell. Like angels falling from grace, the stars had shamed the skies with their unspoken disobedience, and were thrown from their pedestals.

But beneath the din of dogs barking, cars whining and middle-aged men growling, the soft snaps of a pop rock groove floated from the radios of a dozen homes.

I thank the Lord for the night time
To forget the day
A day of up, uptight time
Baby, chase it away
I get relaxation, it's a time to groove
I thank the Lord for the night time
I thank the Lord for you.

Resistant to the static.

***

2014.

The sun had begun. Begun its unholy descent into the depths of a shadowy gloom. Gloom from which it would not emerge for another thousand years. Years in which the downturned faces of the hollowed lower city brush against one another blindly, reaching out to rough cold brick for solace. They turn away from one another as they bump unsolicited into grasps unwelcome. Solace will not come in the darkness.

Sam closed the blinds as the last rays hesitated on the horizon, returning to the comfortable familiarity of electric-powered light sources, glad the Day of Étaín was almost over. Only a few hours remained before the residents of Scunthorpe could resume their routines in the winding streets. He could already feel the temperature dropping slightly as he reached for the wardrobe.

'Jess, the sun's almost set. We should probably call Dean.' He emerged with two thick coats, wrapping a scarf around his neck as he spoke, the soft crimson wool alive in the atmospheric lighting. The much larger coat was tugged over his three layers of shirts and jackets as Jess entered the bedroom in her casual summer vest and grey thermal trousers.

'Ready, but I think Dean's already in the lower city,' she grimaced as she let Sam drape her in another layer of clothing, 'He isn't picking up his phone.'

Sam was silent as he moved to the window, peering between the shutters, waiting. But the sun seemed intent on winning the staring contest. He looked away as she spoke up.

'You need to talk to him. He's your brother.'

'Look, I know it isn't normal to want to be out during sunlight hours, but as long as he isn't waving his ass directly in the glare for longer than an hour, I don't see why we should bother him about it.' Sam sighed, adjusting the buttons on his sleeves, 'He'll be fine.'

An hour passes, and the sky is clear. They leave hand in hand, smiling at each other in the puddles of flickering streetlights.

Thank the Lord for the night time.

***

A man takes a heavy step. It is unmeasured, unsteady. It rests for a moment on the frozen cement of the past, before the heel lifts a centimetre towards the unlit heavens. Heavens which were lost. The man heaves several breaths, the air puffing in an ashen silence. His hood is raised; his nape clings to the carelessly thin textile. His outstretched fingers, a ghostly white were there light, crush gently against the lapel of an unknown neighbour. The neighbour either does not feel it, or ignores it.

The man once again steps, towards a dim iridescence. Perhaps it is pure imagination that draws him. All he knows is that this light, calls to him.

‘Dean.’

He turns.

The silence which greets him is shrieking. His eyes recoil from the darkness as if the sun had been switched off in a thoughtless moment. He can feel them trying, trying so hard, to adjust to the night. But his blown wide pupils could only stretch so far before the black became.

They shrink a nanometre as a presence flickers.

Within an inch of his nose, the man, Dean, can feel the ghosting breath of another person - man, woman, child, Sam… he can’t tell. But it isn’t the person that calls to him. It isn’t a physical call, but rather a visceral one. It shrivels as it approaches his navel, his ears and grasps his shoulders. But then it expands as it crawls into the hollow spaces between his ribs, cradling his sluggish organs and whispering of warmth.

He steps into silence.

Only moments ago, the wild gods of the west traversed the sky in their flaming chariots. How he missed it already; the absence of frost upon his lip, of mist on his tongue. In the last seconds of Étaín, he could've sworn he saw a silhouette cross the surface of the setting sun, trailing its wings behind it.

But they all thought he was another Apolloist, the title given to the solatics who claimed the sun wasn't just as bad as deep, deep, deep, deep winter.

Maybe it was true.

Now, he can only struggle forward in the hoarfrost that grows before his eyes. Only force of will lifts his sluggish limbs from frostbite in the unlit lower city. This part of town had as bad a rep as you could get without being from the west. With no electricity, only the desperate and poor roamed here. Most were motionless, having long lost the will to care.

They became the trees of winter.

Simple silence.

Gravel crunching against ice.

'Dean.'

A flash of something blinds him, erupting in fireworks behind his closed lids. A light.

'D-did you see that?' Dean demands of the frozen man he touched earlier. There is no response, of course. Just a burning cold reminder in the fingertips that came into contact with the man's icy lapels.

Ten Old Days was all these people had. The Day of Étaín. The Day of the Sun. Who could say if it was a sadder life than their electricity-dependent counterparts. Dean certainly couldn't. Even now, he was heading back up to his brother's heaters and mittens for a cup of hot cocoa.

'Dean.' It beckoned again. 'Come.'

Down an alley, and across an abandoned path of dead or very near.

And there, lying in a ditch, gasping for thin breaths, was a tax accountant.

But when he turned to Dean, his eyes were luminescent. They burned right through him, the colour of sky. Not normal sky; of Étaín sky. Sky when the sun was at its peak in the eastern world. Sky so rare and unseen that the last written accounts were still being scribbled by fanatics as Dean gazed straight into the empyrean.

Again, the visceral call promises warmth as it takes Dean's insides apart. It comes not from the man's mouth, but as if from deep within.

'Who are you?'

'My name is Castiel.' His voice was a deep seraphic whisper. 'And I'm here to raise the sun.'

Thank the Lord for you.

~OvO~

Author's Note: I don't care anymore. 1385 words. This story was going to be epic. But I ruined it with bad time management and the inability to work at late hours. Also yes, it was originally a Supernatural fanfic idea, and I decided to keep it that way, cause I'm a lazy butt. You can tell which bits I wrote tonight cause it's atrocious. Few notes:

• Thank the Lord for the Night Time is a song by Neil Diamond released sometime in 1967. 
• Étaín is an Irish sun goddess. 
• Apolloists are obviously made up and based on Apollo - chosen as my main choices were Celtic and Roman influences. 
• solatics - a play on 'lunatics' since that came from 'moon-sick'. 
• Scunthorpe is actually a town in England. 
• Patricians - nobles back in Ancient Rome. 
• Empyrean - the highest part of heaven, thought by the ancients to be the realm of pure fire / the visible sky

If you didn't understand the story at all, which don't worry I understand, cause it was total bollocks, here is a quick explanation cause I'm just pissed at myself:

Alternate universe where science screwed up, and the rotation of the Earth changed so that in the eastern world (i.e. continents excluding Americas) would have 1000 years of night, and 10 days of sunlight. Due to this crappy arrangement, the western world basically died out and became a desert. Of course, the point where the 'Earth became still' is actually the birth of Christ. 

In 1967, the angels fell. Why 1967? Cause I said so. So from 1967, there were no stars either. Lol I forgot about the actual moon. Oops #yolo. 

The story as I first wrote it starts from the final segment, where Dean is walking in the ice, and hears a visceral voice calling him. It was originally Castiel, an angel, calling him so they could save the world (because the original plot was very different), but then for this challenge I realised I had to explain it all to you guys somehow without delving too deep into SPN universe, and it screwed up loads. Obviously there are so many holes in this story it ain't funny. Like for one, Neil Diamond is an American. And I killed America. 

Okay, goodnight. I promise to rewrite this one if you liked the idea though. 

#WRITERSNEVERDIE

Hey guys! Exciting news!

We're back with a new series of beautifully written pieces for your personal devouring and enjoyment, delivered live and flapping like freshly floundering salmon straight to your computer screen.

Our new program schedule will be broadcasting individual pieces every second Sunday, starting from the Special Pilot episode this weekend, before university starts for your loverly writers.

And on that note... Introducing, the writers of this season!

• Your beloved returning cast: Jennifer, Alicia and Katrina 
• Fresh meat: Maggie and Alison

But this season, there's a twist.

Gone are the 30 minute writing restrictions. Gone are the restrictive genres of belonging. GONE ARE OUR BORDERS.

This season... our hearts, minds, creative limits, and procrastinative abilities can't hold it back anymore and are letting it go! (sorry)

The new rules:

• any written text type is cool. (e.g. short story, poetry, scientific report, documentary, speech, presidential address, resume etc. BE CREATIVE) 
• the minimum effort required needs to feel like you actually really tried ok?
• no writing time limits 
• one prompt a fortnight - must be addressed sufficiently in your piece. do not include it as a random reference. you still have to use it like you would a stimulus in high school, just maybe a bit more creatively this time. 
• each πece is due Sunday 11:59 PM AEST

Happy imaginative writing, and may the motivation be ever in your favour! 

Don't miss out!!!

Parade - The Bus Will Come by Alicia

The Bus Will Come

There is difficulty in maintaining the contents of a mug when it is not built for travel.

Here I am, awash in rain.

Amelia flexes her wrist softly in a circular motion, watching as the opaque brown stuff sloshes gently from side to side in her rapidly cooling mug – it meekly suggests CPS Current Population Survey on its curved face in a thin, grey, bending typeface. A little pale sunlight Toyota hurtles past, jostling the little party of water molecules and city street pollution into frenzy. She takes the chance to look down the busy road, looking for the merest sign of the tall blocky bus shape. There is none, yet.

Leather boots are not an adept demonstration of practicality when it is raining buckets of goldfish.

She totters in the short heels, wriggling her feet in a rather unpleasantly squelchy fashion as she shudders at the sensation of moisture seeping into her toes. Bus, bus, bus, bus where are you? A large droplet of rain has gathered its nearest comrades and has tumbled into her mug. Amelia’s eyebrows wrinkle in a small resigned annoyance as she watches it disperse into homogenousness with habile chemical ability. A figure steps into her peripheral vision, dressed in the mutually-accepted-by-society colours of black, brown, and black.

Amelia decides to swirl the tea again because she can see a small particle of rainwater which has not dissolved into the rest of the watery stuff – she’s not even sure it’s concentrated teabag enough to be called tea anymore.

An umbrella is essential when you see a swivel of cloud dusting the skies.

Rain on me. My jacket can handle it.

Of course, no one thinks to take an umbrella when they work in a petite little bookstore on the corner of Cleveland and Crown; that little plastic bin full of fold up and stick brollies is only for the lovely patrons who flutter in, bringing with them their own smells – coffee, cigarettes, cars, cardboard or even carcinogenic carbon. Amelia is that girl who sits behind the counter at Oscar’s reading a book about physics one day, and hearing the echoing sentiment of ‘old boy’ the next.

Never let tea cool if you intend on drinking it.

Bah! She swallows it gingerly.

That figure from before, on the edge of her peripheral vision, walks over with a smile – at least she imagines it to be a smile behind the darkness that is the hair and the hoodie and the everything dazzling about this newcomer.

Dazzlingly brilliant and as fresh as spring rain – until their hand raises and plops five sugar cubes rather arrogantly into her mug. This contumely from a no doubt self-named tea-genius has offended her. Amelia sniffs discordantly and steps away, the sly letters CPS turning to face the glass barrier of the bus stop instead of the stranger.

The bus will come, but do not expect it to come on time.

The stranger seems oddly put out – their shoulders have slumped. Amelia cannot find it in her tea-loving heart to feel any sympathy for someone who has just ruined her tea.

And yet, in that moment, as her eyes focus away from her thoughts to the distant horizon of the street, she sees that chunky block that is definitely a bus.

The right bus.

She throws her arm out into the gunfire, an imbalance of cold and warm singing as bullets of rain repeatedly strike her bare wrist and open palm. Her shadow stranger does the same. The bus huffily comes to a halt, the base of its steps teetering precariously towards the kerb.

There is a moment where it is just the sound of her cold breath mingling with the sighing of the engine, a romantic backdrop of rain pattering away on the roof of the bus shelter and the bus itself – and then the doors clatter open with some exasperated sounding pumps.

Board the bus, you little peasant.

Mind the gap.

Amelia minds the gap very much. The other steps forth unhesitatingly, jumping over the gutter and into the damp metal shell of the bus. Their steady sneakers beckon. She hastens to do the same, even as she watches with a sinking heart, the deepened wound of her severely diluted tea.

Finally, frisson, when the confined space of the pass traps you.

She sidles over, CPS raised high above her breast at a safe distance from the ground. Amelia does well in dipping her pass, and she listens in pleasure to the chirping duet of the two machines in synchrony with one another – the other has dipped too.

Only then does she remember the predicament of the pass.

A bat-like object comes into contact with her shoulder, continuing forward with the velocity of an accidental steam engine. Amelia can hear the apology on the other person’s lips, but she can only hear her own silent profanity as the foldable black umbrella comes to a shuddering halt right above her mug.

And releases a torrential downpour of sulfurous and haloalkane infested liquid.

Amelia turns instinctively towards the other person, only to glance at the Funny Girl poster behind them, absorbing the long brown locks tucked away in the abyss of a green hoodie. The other woman looks at the poster too, and is amused at an untold joke, understands an untold story, foresees an unforetold future. 

But all Amelia cares about right now is saying this:

No you seriously cannot rain on my parade.

~OvO~

Author's Note: Woah 912 words. I got a lot carried away. Wrote for about 45-50 min. It doesn't relate to belonging - it's a story about Amelia who is a girl waiting for a bus in the rain, remembering some advice, and meeting a lovely young stranger who just happens to annoy her a lot. I'm really sleepy, so most of this is really badly paced and everything. I might fix it later, I just felt so guilty because we have class today and I don't have anything complete to give in. :( 

Also, Funny Girl is the original musical that the song "Don't Rain On My Parade" is from. I didn't know how to end it and use the quote from the stimulus, so I did that. 

Hope everyone else updates soon! :)

Guidance - Devolution by Alicia

Devolution

This is our world.

This is our universe.

Humanity was a speck of existence. We… we are the giants who stand on the shoulders of quarks.

***

78^th of Stymphalian, 5608

For the first time in a long time, I once again began to question who I was. Humdrum answers pulsed through my brain: you’re a human presenting as the most prominent result.

I have a routine, as humans do. My routine is to wake up and not die. Not dying is a great daily objective, though not as easily accomplished as you might think. Every few days I pass through the tunnels of a time of truth transcended into dust. Man has left his imprint upon this cave’s walls. I see the archaic infrastructure of an anti-gravitational aeronautical transportation scrawled in the form of a blueprint. In bold letters atop the sheet in an ancient laptop’s typeface, it says BOEING 787 DREAMLINER. Its edges remain pressed behind the glass forged of a distant era, its sheets a mellow cream-white.

I travel the thundering tunnels, wandering in the darkness, wondering of the light.

I press my palm into the dry soil to my right, waiting as it glows to life with a singing enthusiasm.

"Transmitting…"

My impatience level is high, a trait non-existent in the artworks of my ancestors. These humans of old, with such delicate spirit, manoeuvred the globe to seek answers. How could they withstand the hours and days in their medieval flight technology? The 5590s edition of the arc-optic transmat twitters as it prepares for beaming. My hand is inevitably warming to the contact of hyper-carbon fibre on flesh as I wait. I envy my great grandfather, who experienced the speed and processing capacity of the mid 55^th century.

The darkness fades with a soft ping!

The guidance of our forebears has become simplified into a solitary catechism.

“STOP MOVING FORWARD. WE'VE GONE TOO FAR.”

Chasing a dream has become racing from a nightmare. The integrity of humanity has decomposed into the pitch black of loss into which I’m falling.

Crummy lamplight tumbles into existence as I flicker into my mother’s living room. Thin tinkling trembles through the teacups. The strange time-keeper in the corner chimes in a low tenor, bothering Amphisbaena from his slumber by the heater. He growls with a sneer. My mother has a priceless collection of road signs from a millennium ago. They all speak the same message of warning, hidden in undertones as they scream at drivers from their odd pixel manifestations.

I wait for my particles to cease their painful fusion – an unavoidable side effect of the old transmat, the only one we could afford in the new world.

I imagine the day that my cells simply don’t realign.

It’s a possibility.

I simply don’t understand humans anymore. 

~OvO~

Author's Note: 467 words. I actually went at least 5 minutes over. I wrote more than half of this blind before I actually remembered I had a stimulus and three words to shove in. So it barely relates, and the three words really were shoved in. 

I actually had many different thoughts on the direction of this story as I was writing, and it was actually my 3rd idea. My first was a repressed Victorian era young lady, my second was a young man leaving for the war with the story from the perspective of the mothers left behind (how typical), and this was my third. 

My story is a post-apocalyptic view on humans, which struggles to restore its previous height of enlightenment, even with the ancestors telling them not to, warning them to heed the warnings that they themselves did not. Honestly, it needs a lot of development. I wanted to end it with a view on the past, to maybe the persona's grandfather working with scientists and considering the moral implications etc. etc. But my mum called for dinner and :( food

Some paraphernalia:

• 78th of Stymphalian, 5608 - I made up a futuristic calendar. This story is set in the year 5608, the month Stymphalian, on the 78th day. 
• Stymphalian Birds are man-eating birds from Greek mythology [click the link for wiki page]. 
• Boeing 787 Dreamliner is one of Boeing's newer aeroplane models, introduced in October '11. 
• arc-optic is completely made up. I was thinking of optic fibre speeds. Originally I wrote just optic but it seemed too our-contemporary, so I added a random "arc" in front of it to seem more futuristic.
• hyper-carbon fibre - same as above. I was thinking of those transparent plastic displays we have nowadays. 
• Transmat - is a transport booth from general sci-fi, similar to a transporter in Star Trek. I really couldn't think sci-fi creative enough today. 
• Amphisbaena is a snake with two heads, also from Greek mythology. In my story it's the name of their pet (the futuristic species of which I'll leave to your imagination)

I'm upset about this story, because I wish I was bothered and had enough time to bring it up to standard. Oh well, criticise away! :P

Fight - 99 Luftballons by Alicia

99 Luftballons

1139 hours, Vandenberg Air Base, CA.

“Sir, are you sure?”

“Are you here to question my orders, or to follow them, Lieutenant?” Commanding Officer Phillip Savoy barked, his hands tightening into fists by his thighs.

The officer beside him assumed an expression of obedience, but not before Savoy glimpsed the contempt and fear. They were in the middle of a war here, and it was not the time for frightened officers to forget their place.

 “Launch missilery action Lima Alpha.”

The order was repeated and echoed across the room until it was transmitted into the radio communication system.

“Echo Romeo Tango, launching Lima Alpha countdown in 5...”

 Across the fiery evening sky, missiles streamed, trailing a blazing pure white tail of steam towards unsuspecting destruction.

“ETI two minutes…”

***

1840 hours, East Germany.

“Maria, let’s go home.”

Maria jumped off the small construction of torn brick and items that people simply didn’t want anymore. Her patchy red shoes scuffed against an old wooden doll that had lost the glimmer of its maker’s love. The long pleat of her skirt brushed past a heavy scorched leather suitcase weighed down by a mountain of memories and lost faith. In the glimmering heat of the sunset, they glowed with an unnatural presence as if warning them 

to forget, or was it to remember?

Her younger brother, Friedrich, ran around her in circles, his head thrown back and lips parted as he gazed upwards to the horizon, towards their design. Already, their art was far away. The fluorescing eyes of streetlamps as they made their way down the Straße hissed in anticipation of night.

More eyes began to emerge from darkened alleyways as cats slinked outwards, marking their way around the two children in silence and care. 

Fifty stars came shooting out of the sky.

Dogs could be heard in the distance, barking in paranoia about the ninety-nine red balloons the two children had set free into the air.

What stupid dogs they were. 

~OvO~

Author's Note: 330 words. I know, I cheated with the stimulus a bit. But I did this story as a roughly (highly inaccurate) historical fiction because I'm trying to write my After the Bomb story and I'm getting really stuck.

In case it wasn't apparent, the dogs are the Americans, and for some reason, cats are Germans. This is highly inaccurate. The fifty stars are the missiles, it's a bit hyperbolic but it seemed fittingly American. 

AH! The name of this and the story idea itself, is all entirely based on the song called 99 Luftballons by Nena. It's an anti-war song written sometime during the Cold War, which translates to 99 Red Balloons in English. 

• Strasse (or Straße) is German for street. 
• ETI is Estimated Time Impact, although I just made that up. 
• The times seem really weird, being 1139 and then 1840, but it's apparently a 7 hour difference between America and Germany. I just didn't bother checking specifically for California. 

An Instant - To sleep, perchance to dream by Alicia

To sleep, perchance to dream

It would be cliché to say that it was all a blur; to say that all the instruments seemed to flare to life at once; to say that he, Richard Finn, could not respond.  

His hands were before his eyes, fluctuating in and out of focus as he pulled his screaming spine backward. Heavy grey shapes clung to the windows, pressing down, leering at the two men. The darkness clogged his eyelids as Richard tried to eliminate the echoing flash of lightning that blinded him. Everything was drained of its correct colour, the flashing emergency lights an eerie pink, the four stripe epaulettes upon his sleeve a diminishing vanilla. He sank against the cool hard leather back of his pilot’s seat, and tried to breathe through his nostrils.

The distant echo of his daughter’s laughter tangled with the muffled silence in his ears. Nothing connected.

Faintly, the flickering altimeters reminded him of something he saw in a textbook once.

He felt the soft smile of his wife lingering in the sunshine as she chattered to the neighbours, the Almantises from Florence. Nothing connected.

Faintly, he could see the strained face of his first officer, a freshly qualified young man called Stephen, speaking to ATC. But Richard could not hear the words beyond a blur of sound.

He smelt the memory of an Irish tea, sweet, with a dash of skim milk, the faint press of flush crimson lipstick painted on the lip of the teacup. But that didn’t connect either.

‘…one.’ Something from a textbook.

‘Captain…’ A textbook about aeroplanes, ‘…hear me?’

The other man’s hands were everywhere, assessing the damage, his lips moving silently but rapidly. Another blinking red light winked into existence, and Stephen swallowed, taking a deep breath, as Richard watched, and his lips moved slower than before. Slow, but fast - URGENT.

‘Cabin crew prepare…emergency...’  Richard closed his eyes tightly, wincing at the exhausted pain behind them. A faint green echo shone in the blackness. His heartbeat quickened. There was a dull ache in his forehead. Richard’s hands crept forward reflexively.

‘I have control, Stephen.’

The darkening clouds rumbled, the deep resonance rolling a depression in the atmosphere. Richard watched as the carburettor indicator fired into action, joining the cacophony of recorded warnings. They were rapidly losing altitude.

‘Sir, we’re flying one-engine.’ Plummeting. Yet the clouds did not thin.

Richard pushed the A318 into preparations for emergency landing, cursing the two useless turbine engines dragging them down hard. He needed to see the ground. Chaotic sensors screamed. But even on the ground, Richard was not in control. The clouds wouldn't move.

A cyclone battered mercilessly against the hull of the smallest Airbus member. The yoke jerked beneath his white knuckles, shuddering. The jolts ran along his body, rooting to his toes, forcing him to struggle, to scream, to MOVE.

“Get out of my house, Richard.” She turned her back on him, as if equal and opposite forces would push him away, out the door.

No, no, it didn’t connect to anything.

The recorded warning was no longer intelligible above the noise of the jet’s shuddering. Stephen had gone pale beside him, frantically requesting weather reports, weather reports, weather reports on approach. ATC, a bloke named Kevin, his voice was quiet. He calmly told them about the 58 mph crosswinds on approach.

“Look out, mate, she’s gusting to ten. Sure you want to brave this storm?” Carl was saying, standing in the driveway with his car keys hanging loosely from his index finger where it swung back and forth like a pendulum. Hypnotic in its deceptive uselessness.

An instant in the wind, suspected multiple bird strikes, hydraulics malfunction, multiple engine failure, carburettor failure, altimeter failure, anti-icing failure, failure, failure…failure… fail…ure…

“Pull up. Pull up. Pull up.” The recorded warning announced cheerily, carelessly.

An image of a sharp woman with a clipboard, sighing, as he stared at a point above her head, vanished. It seemed to connect, but then it didn’t.

‘Flaps 30, full reverse throttle, Stephen.’

‘Roger.’

The runway was too far left. The ground reared up like a snake poised for attack, wondering if it would allow the pathetic little white mouse to touch it before it struck. A heaviness caught Richard unawares, his grip faltering.

‘Landing gear, sir?’

Of course, bloody landing gear. He nodded drowsily, hoping his FO’s frightened, intense staring at the senior pilot-in-command was paying off.  

Concussion - another failure. The 34L loomed slightly off centre as he slumped heavily. The rain drummed on the metal casing of the flight deck, hollow like the cavity in his chest…low…quieting…darkening…  

‘SIR…’ The first officer’s protest fizzled out with the last lights in the cabin.

Richard’s hands slipped from the yoke.

To sleep, perchance to dream.

***

Flight 8122 smashed into the tarmac, but Richard Finn was already senseless in the darkness. The gentle smattering applause of a drizzling rain resounded in the emptiness, trailing after the last spindles of that instant. The wind was still.  

~OvO~

Author's Note: 831 words. I wrote for 50 minutes, sorry! I have been damned waiting to write about planes! A lot of this is probably wrong though, in terms of emergency procedures, plane malfunctions etc. At first, I had about 300 words written like a disaster movie, and then I remembered it had to relate to belonging hahaha that's why it's sort of terrible.

Definitions & technical terms:

• Epaulettes for pilots are stripes that you wear on your uniform to show what qualifications/rank you hold - four stripes is Captain. I hope that explains a lot, Maggie. 
• Altimeters measure the altitude of the plane. 
• ATC is Air Traffic Control, it's the dude that sits in the cool towers at the airport and direct planes, give permission for landing etc. 
• Carburettor - I think our engineers might know what this is? :) It determines the amount of fuel drawn into the airstream based on speed and pressure of airflow. For engines. I think.
• A318 - the smallest member of the Airbus family. I was so proud to have remembered this random fact, but I checked it up just in case. 
• Airbus is a big airline company, like Boeing. 
• Yoke is the new modern term for joystick basically. 
• A crosswind is any wind that has a perpendicular component to the line or direction of travel. In aviation, a crosswind is the component of wind that is blowing across the runway making landings and take-offs more difficult than if the wind were blowing straight down the runway. (copied from Wikipedia)
• Hydraulics control the plane. Engineers, take over for me for this one. 
• Anti-icing is basically that; it anti-ices. It's this liquid that's put on the plane to prevent it from icing over - different to de-icing which is used to get rid of ice. 
• Flaps 30, full reverse throttle - Creative licence. I sort of stole this from a book about Qantas' failures, and I'm definitely not sure if I'm using it right. It's a type of prep for landing. 
• FO is First Officer 
• 34L is one of the main runways (the East-West) at Charles Kingsford Smith airport - not sure if it would actually be used for emergency Airbus landings... creative licence! 

If anyone's curious about the intertextual references or just plain fandom references in this story (which I doubt is any of you at all), I'll put them up on the Alicia page. 

Please criticise my story. No one's been criticising my stories lately. :( 

Orchids - Teangmháil by Alicia

Teangmháil 

Charlotte delved into the darkened corner of the library, fingertips brushing the spines of the books, imagining their leaves shivering in the dusk. There was something beautiful about diving into the deepest bookshelves with only the whispers of thousands of men and women to guide her in the pitch black. She wondered why the lights had gone off so early in the evening; it wasn't closing time for another hour, give or take twelve minutes. 

Eventually, she dusted herself off in an area she couldn't recognise by the bumps in the carpet. For there were none in this section; the feeling of well worn thread had been left behind in the overhanging gloom. Beneath her rubber soles, she sensed the hard flat surface of a lonely Constitutional collection or a Gaelic realm beyond her translation. Charlotte could hear the valiant cries of kings and knights, hushed between the uncracked pages of the heavy volumes. She could almost see the jumble of legality which was almost a different language in itself.

Charlotte wanted to know, wanted to see. She withdrew a book at random, and retraced her footsteps. As the uneasy glow from the fluorescent lights of the children’s section peered from behind the anthology shelves, she looked down to the precious specimen she had retrieved from its companions of the night.

ADTIMCHIOL AN CHREIDIMH COMHAGHALLUIDHEDAR AN MAIGHISER, AGAS AN LEANAMH

The words made no sense. Charlotte set the book down on a study desk, and opened it.

Ages – she wondered if it could possibly be centuries – of dust and heavy compression indicated there was something lodged. Something left behind.

Between two entrenched pages of rich Gaelic text titled Teangmháil and the crunch of yellowing paper, was a bookmark. A bookmark which from the first glance appeared to be not much older than Charlotte was. It was a slim strip of cardboard, as wide as two fingers and long as her hand. On closer inspection, there was a date, firmly written in a flowing signature – 20^th March 1887 – which definitely made it much, much, much older than Charlotte.

She flipped it over, and on the back, was the faded outline of a flower. It was an orchid. A white one, its pure albicant petals barely visible, but quietly luminescent. Charlotte recognised it from the thousands of delicate illustrations of passionate botanists in the Botany section downstairs. Her father gave her mother one last year, to commemorate their fourteenth anniversary. It now lay preserved, behind a thick glass case and enveloped in solid resin.

But what was it doing in an original Gaelic translation?

Charlotte rose from her seat, with the book in hand – and bookmark safely pressed inside - and asked Ms Lima to lend her a magnifying glass. The faint folds of the orchid revealed an inscription in dim black ink which had diminished over time to a scrawny blue.

My darling Violet, please accept this orchid. My affections for you have only begun and bear not the inkling of a conclusion. They will never end alike the tales we both do cherish. - J.H.H

The young girl, fond of books for reasons she had never quite been able to comprehend beyond the companionship of their friendly whispers, smiled. Charlotte returned to the comforting shelves of abandoned old men with wigs, wondering how many of them really were just dashing young and noble Victorians.

She replaced the last living relic of these two long lost souls whose bodies had perished with time, into the vessel which fulfilled the mysterious J.H.H’s everlasting promise. 

~OvO~

DON'T READ THE AUTHOR'S NOTE IF YOU'RE ON A TIGHT SCHEDULE. IT'S ~20CM LONG.

Author's Note: 592 words. I will take this moment to say I really can't write soppy romance - not even indirectly. I actually did Googling whilst writing this, to substantiate the Gaelic and flower inferences. A few reasons and explanations which I feel entitled to give as disclaimers for my carp: 

•  Teangmháil means Encounter, and is an Irish (not Scottish, and I'll explain why this is bad) Gaelic love poem about someone whose loneliness and silence is touched by this other person's (the love) loneliness and they kiss. But this moment lasts only a short while and goes away again. The kiss however, hovers and becomes a cloud which sometimes descends in that moment of silent silence at night to rid of the loneliness again. :) So i thought that was an appropriate page for that bookmark to be on.
• However, Adtimchiol an chreidimh comhaghalluidhedar an maighiser, agas an leanamh is an ancient SCOTTISH Gaelic text written in 1631 by Jean Calvin, and I don't even know what the book is about because I just can't find it on Google, but it's the oldest book held by the Scottish National Library. The inconsistencies keep coming. I'm pretty sure it's not the type of book that has Irish love poetry in it.
• 20th March 1887 is the date of the spring equinox - YES I checked - and somehow that seemed romantic in a spring-y kind of way. Don't ask me I am not a sentimentalist. 
• Originally I was going to set this in Victorian England (hence the 1887 date), with Charlotte as a young lady being wooed, but I just can't write in Victorian so I gave up and set it in a library with the orchid as a bookmark. It's not even a living flower. I'm really crying over this story. 

Alicia Being Reference-y: 

• 1887 is the year Arthur Conan Doyle started publishing Sherlock Holmes
• Yes, I really did almost put J.H.W but changed it to J.H.H so it isn't as obvious 
• Yes, Violet is a reference. To purple. 
• kings and knights - come on Jennifer, what do you think of? 

This story didn't have to be Gaelic, or any of it. It could have been simple. But I had a mental breakdown and somehow wrote Gaelic - a word that I can't help thinking says "garlic". I'm so sorry. 

Please take it and leave me to cry in this corner. This author's note is probably longer than the story. 

TL;DR - I can't write romance. I'm sorry. 

Prison - One Who Got Away, and One Who Didn't by Alicia

One Who Got Away, and One Who Didn't

It is with a sense of apprehension that the sole is lowered on the top step. The weight is deposited with a steady creak from the old timber. Although the time has been practically inconsiderable from the moment of her passing and the moment the officers called, the aged spokes which protrude from the banisters, streaking yellowing varnish to the ground, tangling with dust motes, barely breathing – they are the ones who tell of how much time has passed.  

‘Please come this way,’ one of many men in uniform, leaving his heaviness in the dust, leads the way.

Amelia can hardly remember the last time she heard the cautious creak of the top step beneath her feet. Sometimes in the depths of the night she will think the white paint of her darkened bedroom in Johannesburg melts to the ground, to be replaced with the garish flower wallpaper of her youth... of the room beyond the police officer’s sharp blue cap. But in the morning the memory vanishes on the white wings of day.

The dust is everywhere and it threatens to layer upon the black trench coat she specially chose for the executive meeting with Penelope Branson in the Eighth Quadrant. Instead, the dull ebony seems oddly appropriate for the situation at hand, dimming the hopes Amelia had secretly been harbouring for a transfer to the Eighth. It seems wrong now; she should have worn the grey office suit jacket.

Even as her thoughts drift her away from the crime scene – because that is a more accurate description than she could ever give herself credit for – the detective inspector draws her forward, the steady thudding heartbeat of his rubber boots tugging at her short cloth heels, as if the unseen strings which bound her to the walls as a child had remained all this time, dormant.

Now it returned, compelling her forth like Aunt Clarisse with the cough syrup. Globules of deep oozing plum red which dribbled from the edges of the spoon to flood down her throat.

‘You said she left a message for me?’ Amelia registers the pity on the detective inspector’s lips, and almost smiles in return, to tell him to save the pity for a child who is not already lost.

He reaches into his pocket, past the gun which whispers. A thin piece of white paper, folded in half once by the faint crush of a nail along the crease, with an unexpectedly neat scrawl on the front, is presented. Amelia accepts it, refusing to acknowledge the dark crimson cough syrup which has coagulated inches away – silently it froze in a trickle down the walls, as if tree sap in a room of muted spring blossoms. And opens it.

Amelia, I’m bored of not being you. Sometimes, I can hear them downstairs, screaming, but then you always drown them out with that bloody voice of yours. I want to stop listening, but even Aunt Clarisse has stopped coming with the syrup that sometimes stopped it. Stop it. I know, I can’t get out. I turn and turn in my cell like a fly that doesn’t know where to die. The flowers, they wilt. Eventually, I think I’ll realise when. Just stop.

‘Could you identify the body for us, Miss Richardson?’ His voice is gentle, in a way that is practiced and textbook. Amelia mirrors his body to face the decomposing flesh on the ground that was once a woman, who was once a girl she knew.

Its limbs are oddly spread, angling towards the bed post. It almost appears as if invisible spider threads were wrapped around the body’s wrists and ankles, and shackled to the long worn wood. It seems as if the spider had died before it had the chance to consume its last insect. Or perhaps this is just the carcass that remains.

‘Yes, it’s her.’

Amelia calmly ignored the gentle tug below her thumb, and turned away. 

~OvO~

Author's Note: Hey guys! I wrote a thing! A week late, I'm so sorry I'm a koi carp at deadlines. 

Anyway, this piece was 657 words and not my best work ever (not even close) but I hope you enjoyed it! :) Practically unedited except for some quick end-of-writing-time stuff. I am now going to hurry up and write my Orchids story!!! AAAAH I really want to read Jennifer and Katrina's prison story and Jennifer's Orchids story but I can't because I have to write mine! There are a lot of references in this to things that aren't academic, and it's generally a terribly un-academic story. 

The title, I really couldn't think of anything because there is no dominant theme or motif in this story, and I decided to go with a little Katy Perry. 

Seriously now, point out my grammatical errors and all the other errors and faults!

AAFM - M.I.Noodles: Un Homme Fatale by Alicia

M.I.Noodles: Un Homme Fatale

I am a woman, on a mission.

The registers blinked chirpily. Blocky green digits scrolled across the small screen. Slim white lights lined the bleached plastic ceiling. A sharp crisp beam of albicant fell across the store from the sparkling open refrigerator, shelves and shelves of bottles echoing a muffled shade of their contents. Amy readjusted the worn strap of her handbag, running a thumb along the rough tongue, smoothing it along her shoulder. She stepped past the crates of dull green watermelon, swollen from the heat and their own boastful demeanours as they lay in the brown boxes, begging to be bought. Small cardboard placards appeared from shelves. As Amy stepped further into the packed grocery store, sidling past the two old men bickering in the doorway, more signs jumped up at her like signalling, alert meerkats. Strange black squiggles adorned each one, wrapped around a set of bandied seductive digits often ending in 99.

‘Young lady, have a look at this corn. It’s unbelievably sweet and fresh, we get it from the best possible produce.’ She smiled and walked past the shopkeeper who seized the older woman behind her to persuade.

Another man came hurtling from the spice aisle, patting his worked hands on the black apron tied haphazardly around his hips. Amy opened her mouth to apologise for being in the way, a barely audible little breath squeezed out of her lungs as she spoke. The man yabbered quickly at her in some language, little crinkles appearing between his eyebrows and a clearly spoken frown, before dashing to the back of the store.

‘Okay. Noodles.’ I’m here for the noodles, and then I can leave.

That was her Mission Objective; retrieve noodles, run to Phoebe’s and give her the noodles. It was not a difficult task, even faced with the insurmountable task of wandering into an entirely foreign culture.

‘Sorry.’ Amy squirmed as an older woman pushed around her.

***

Ten minutes later, as she zigzagged her way through every aisle, Amy discovered the six foot shelf of instant noodles. There were a lot, a lot a lot. So many different types of noodles!

For a moment, Amy simply stood, awed at the massive collection of noodles. Noodles everywhere! As her jaw hung open to the floor, a gaggle of three girls around her age of sixteen slid gracefully with well-practiced manoeuvres, past the crowds of people rushing in and out of the front entrance like a midnight tide embracing the bright daylight.

Outside, the busy bustle of cars as they dissolved into the night was a reassuring reminder that Amy had not simply dissolved into this parallel universe of ceiling-high noodles and bright fluorescent lights.

The girls left as quickly as they had emerged, passing through the checkpoint and out into the flowing night. Amy jittered, pacing back and forth amongst the stock, wondering which ones she would buy, fluttering anxiously before remembering that Phoebe had written a shopping list as she lay feverish at home.

‘Beef.’ Great, apart from being very unspecific, I can’t read Chinese.

And then she realised that the price tags were written in English as well. Amy bent down to examine the lower shelves, hoping to find a worthy price for all the options. Another twenty minutes flew by as she read every single label, noting at least fifteen different brands offering a variation of a beef flavoured instant noodles.

She sighed, reaching across to seize the first within reach, her fingers brushing over the soft silky touch of the plastic wrapping. When she had successfully stacked five circular cartons into her arms, Amy turned to leave, promptly walking into another customer and dropping all the noodles on the floor.

‘Sorry!’

Amy bent down to pick them all up as they teasingly rolled at a torturously slow but rapid pace along the muddied plastic tiles.

‘No, I'm sorry, here let me help.’ The deep resonating sound of a young man pulled her from her frantic crawl across the floor. The mystery man pulled her to her feet, ‘Here you go.’ Two of the larger noodles bowls had slid into his arms, or had he conjured them with magic? Amy just wasn’t sure what side of the magical portal she was on anymore.

‘Thanks.’

He smiled, a glimmer of amusement appearing in his – surprisingly – blue eyes, and moved past her, the coarse fabric of his sandy trench coat briefly conversing with the fibres of her deep blue summer dress.

Amelia left the store, a bulging plastic bag in one hand and the neatly (obviously pre-prepared) inked phone number of a certain mystery magician on a shard of Paris postcard in the other.

The darkness of the night swallowed her as she strolled away from the entrance of the little Asian grocery, the thick luminescence stretching outwards until its fingers could no longer find her.

The sky was black with anticipation. Stars winked with the sound of wet dripping paint. Amy’s grip tightened on the slippery plastic bag as the warmth of summer enveloped her in a tight loving embrace, full of hope and wonder. 

Author's Note: Originally 838 words upon story's finish. Now, I'm going to rough-edit and see what happens. [post-edit: 852 words] This story started off very serious, I had intentions to make it sad where Amelia was a despondent child from a poor home, but then midway I just decided to turn it into a bit of a half serious crack (humour) piece. And I also had an idea to end with a love story to be a bit cliche in a funny way? But I ran out of time and couldn't see how I could develop their relationship in that short instance of time; it didn't have the right sort of setting or feel to it. I'm sorry I just feel like explaining myself today. The title is a bit of a weird pun I guess, that actually doesn't even fit with my story haha. The M.I.Noodles is obviously Mission Impossible Noodles. ;) Une femme fatale as my readers might know is French for those women who are deadly attractive, and because I randomly added in Mr Mysteriously Magical, I just decided to make him Un Homme Fatale. Selina, please correct me because I'm not sure if it's fatale or fatal. I actually Googled it. :( Yes, the first line is from that song that I don't actually like. (I am a woman, on a mission, woah~ Nothing can stop me, I'm stronger than ever... etc. by Gabriella Cilmi, yes Google.) 

Anyway! Really long Author's Note, the three girls was a reference to the day Selina, Vanessa and I went to buy instant noodles hahaha. I was going to try set a sense of ambience in the opening paragraph, but then I got a little not-bothered. Haha you can practically see the exact moment when I just stop caring about how well I write it. (the ***) Also, the ending is rushed. TIME is not to be wasted, my friends. 

Tl;dr - So, this is my piece for the week! :D Hope you liked it, or at least laughed a bit? Smiled? Inwardly...? 

Model - An Empty Seat by Alicia

An Empty Seat

Beep. 

'Good morning sir, I have your mother on line 3.' 

'Thank you, Anna. Please put her through.' 

Beep. 

'Hi mum.'

There was a short pause where the flick of a phone cord fluttered through the speaker. 

'Hello Sammy. How's work? I was just wondering if you'd like to come over for dinner tonight, you've heard about Danielle and Christopher, haven't you?'

'I can't I'm sorry.' Through the thick interior glass wall of his office, Sam watched his secretary rearranging the pens on her desk, pausing to type something with swift fingers, phone cradled between ear and shoulder. He twirled a set of car keys around his thumb. 

'Please? You two... haven't spoken in such a long time.' Sam had spoken to Danielle last week, listening with a smile as his exuberant younger sister retold the tale of Chris' proposal with avid detail and teary relish. No, it was his father he hadn't spoken to in five years.

'I still don't want to. Tell Danielle I'm sorry. Bye mum.' 

He could hear the hesitance on the other end of the line, 'Alright. Bye Sammy, I love you.' 

Sam rolled back in his chair, resting his head on the pristine white leather. His thoughts fell on the objects which scattered themselves vaguely on the large expanse of marble and polished glass that was his new "CEO" table. Two sides of his office were indiscriminately painted white walls. The other was a floor to ceiling window with a panoramic view of the city. This was everything, his new world. But sometimes, when Sam stayed late to keep his assistant company in her vigil, all he could see on that horizon was the pastry hot orange smog that hung heavily over the world like a winter cloak that refused to come off in summer. It was suffocating.

Somewhere in the west, his family would be gathering for a happy event, just as they had for many years without him. Now, as he dwelled, ominous clouds rimmed the sky with an ultramarine menace. They hovered over his urban world, just as these thoughts muddied in his mind. 

A text slammed his mobile into vibration. A temporary respite as the pond slime marginally dissipated.

Sam, I won't even try talk you into coming, because I know you don't believe I'm allowed to lecture you. But I will keep a seat here for you. Dad says hi. - Dani.

It was more likely he had said good riddance. 

***

Eleven winters ago.

'Sam can you place the glasses on the table.' The sprawling teenage boy clunked his thick novel down on the ebony piano with a heavy resignation. The glasses were placed, one, two, three...to eight. Small sparkling rainbows gleamed off the facets of the taller glasses, swimming round the bulbous shorter ones and swallowed by the darkness of his ceramic mug.

Once the job was done, he sat back down in the doorway of his bedroom, opened the book and drowned himself in the sorrows of Westeros.

'Sam's about to finish high school, isn't he?' Aunt Rosamund exclaimed loudly. Her voice was shrill friction against the crystalline hum of the cutlery. Jarring. Unpleasant. 'Has he any idea what he wants to do? Our little Mary is doing so well in school, but really Year 9 is when it starts to count towards your future, isn't it?' 

Sam growled and sent his model car on a revenge mission. It tumbled off towards the table. 

In the centre of the dining room folding dough, were his grandmother, his uncle, cousin and aunt. As Sam glanced around the small salle bathed in the sickly yellow light of the solitary light bulb dangling from the recesses of his house, he noticed only the outcasts, his family. Lingering in the corner stood his father, silently forcing down a serving of sticky rice, occasionally beaming down at Sam with amusement in his eyes, which quickly dimmed as he gazed into the rest of the family.

Danielle had hid in the cupboard. Sam promised not to tell anyone until dinner time.

A small red Ferrari rolled across the floorboards. 

'Whose little car is this?' His aunt exclaimed with irritation.

Sam retrieved it from under the table, shooting his aunt a nasty look. 

'Oh.' Is that all you can say, Auntie? The Ferrari glimmered in his hand, whispering of blood and glory. A future. 

***

Sam reached past the neat piles of work contracts that Anna sent in sometime after midday. He picked up the little red Ferrari. A thin layer of coagulated dust rubbed off onto his thumb. The small black tyres had worn into a heavy grey. But the little yellow logo silhouetted by a midnight horse stood bold and strong.

He rubbed his palm against the bottom of the model sports car, feeling the rough plastic plate and the comforting whirr of the wheels as they churned the imaginary engine. Anna had always thought it was his son's, or his nephew's. In truth, it probably should be. 

The car keys beckoned him silently. Sam placed the Ferrari beside the silver framed photos of his sister. 

'Anna,' he began as he pushed open the heavy glass door, 'Could you please have Matthew prepare my car. I have to make an important trip.' 

'Of course, sir.' She smiled, 'Tell Danielle I said congratulations.' 

Downstairs, a little chirp awakened the sleep silhouette of Sam's very new Ferrari.

Author's Note: 905 words. I went ten minutes over. :( I had great plans for this story, but I think I needed at least an extra 20 minutes to have accomplished all I wanted from it, and in the end I decided that I just didn't like it enough. There are a million faults in there!!! D: All of it is just so wrong, but I just don't have the heart to edit it like I did with A Timberwolf's Dove. The name of this one needs work too.
Edit: I've added about a hundred words out of basic editing. :)

Chastity - A Timberwolf's Dove by Alicia

A Timberwolf's Dove

Sometimes in the winter snows a pale snow rabbit dashes across the terrace. Its timberwolf fur, dusted with frozen icing, brushes the snowman's bodice before he disappears into the bushes. Emilia will sit in the window of her home with a hot mug of chocolate, feet tucked in woollen socks, and wait for him to come back. 

On winter nights, the moon frolics on her neighbour's roof, but the stars flicker reproachfully, distant and unyielding. Emilia clutches the thick novel, balancing a glass of mellifluous milk. Her mother is upstairs, rearranging the photo frames and touching the languid curtains. Reminiscent. 

When the spring returns, Emilia finds it difficult not to notice the silver band, singing. It is a long forgiven promise, not forgotten. The grass is simple smaragdine. But the sky is albicant with a flourish of pheasant and pigeon...where are the doves? One of the last sits in the window of her house with a Wordsworth. Emilia has a promise to a lionhearted timberwolf rabbit.

Sometimes in the spring which follows winter, Emilia will see the pale snow rabbit, alone. He is waiting.

Winter is coming, his ears say, before he dashes across the terrace.

I promise, her silver band heralds to the approaching summer. They warn of the endless colour that will flower. They warn Emilia. To stay inside. Summer is for those who go unescorted, for those who do not make promises that cannot be broken. Many times in the summer heat, Emilia will sit on the lawn, and watch the pedestrians parading by; hand in hand, ear to shoulder and heart to heart. She will sit aside and wait for the rabbit, because surviving winter is what matters, until her everlasting summer arrives.

Always, the autumn will tease. The trees shed their layers to shame the name of winter. All the animals hurry away, but not Emilia. She is waiting.

One snowfall winter a pale snow rabbit stops on her terrace. He is a much faded charcoal grey. His ears twitch to say, I have come. 

Emilia is a white dove, the silver band sings.

'Let me lead you into summer, my white dove.'

'I am your white dove.'

~OvO~   END   ~OvO~

Author's Notes: 364 words! :) And I just realised that "lionhearted timberwolf rabbit" sounds like a mash of three animals haha. A few definitions:

• Timberwolf, smaragdine and albicant are all colours; a pale grey, emerald green and white, respectively
• Mellifluous (which I just learnt whilst writing this) means smooth, sweet ...mellifluous milk...?