Saturday 10 January 2015

An Eye For Design

I'm back!  Yep, I'm working in with Chuck Wendig's 'Terrible Mind's Blog again and doing Flash Fiction Fridays... and this is the first one off the blocks. Here's the prompt:  'You think your character is cool? My character is a fucking adventurous half-orc ranger from a bustling city who studied interior dungeon design'

"Get in there you filth!"


The guard shoved me into the disgusting, vomit-inducing room they called a dungeon and slammed the door behind me as I tripped over an overlapping flagstone and fell flat on my face!

"Yuck." I muttered trying not to let my hands touch the almost-black slime covering the floor, "I can't believe they leave people here."
Rising to my knees, I looked around.  This place was most certainly nothing to look at.  I mean, I've been in dungeons - and I've been in dungeons - and this one was, well, crap on a tortilla.  Sighing, I pushed myself to stand without touching the floor and found this room wasn't tiny. 
Smiling I nodded: 'I can do something with this place.'

Being a half-Orc, I have the best of both worlds; that is I enjoy belting the living shit out of the bad guys (whoever they may be at the time of battle) and then I also have a flair with how I dress off the field.  My home is a cave in Myeena Mountains in Mideilena-West; yes that's across the huge swamp and over the land bridge near the elven quarter.  However, how I came to be able to live there - and not be sent away by the elves - has a lot to do with my half-breed upbringing.  You see, my Mother is Elven and my Father was an Orc... okay, you're wondering exactly what they saw in each other.  Well, it was a wartime love.

Elves go through a time of being in ... um... well they're like cats, okay?  They in heat four times a year and will have it off with anyone or anything.  Yes, my Mother saw my father and ... um... well, being an Orc, he's up for anything - especially Elves.
Okay, now you know how I came to be a half-breed. 

Ick... I know!  

But you wanted to know; I know you wanted to know.


I enjoyed the heat of battle and loved coming home to my little piece of paradise.  I often visited my Mother when I did return and she loved it when I did.



But not everyone liked me.


It's not everyday you see an Orc-like creature walking into an Elven village and nobody will go running and screaming to grab weapons and attack them.  


I'm friendly - really - unless I'm fighting against your army in battle; like I said.


And it wasn't until Mother passed away that the village of Elves started to push me out.  It seemed they were only putting up with my presence all these years.  But when they needed a stronger being to help them with uprooting trees or thatching their roofs in Autumn, I was the one they called upon.  If they needed somebody scare away anyone from the village - besides the dogs we already had - I was the one put on guard duty all night.  I was also the one who helped decorate the gardens, the paths, the houses and make their village win The Village To Live in; according to 'Mid-Mountain Monthly Living Scrolls'.  


Yes.  Not long after Mother died, and after we buried her, the Elves of The Committee waited until I was away in battle to fight for our lands to stay as peaceful as they always have been, before building a wall across the road from my home to their village. This road was one they said they'd always keep paved for me - they had promised to keep the way open for the rest of my life to my mother!

To my mother, they had promised this!
And then, when I started taking the wall down, after I returned home with riches of the battle to share with my 'people', they called on their allies:  The Humans.

Oh!  How I hate The Humans.  They pick and destroy without question.  If they see something different or unusual or 'not right', they'll kill it, then realise it was wrong later on.


So, I fought back - as you do when things aren't right when you're attacked for no right reason.  I used my weapons and acted like my Father... 


I acted like an Orc... dammit... I should have kept my head about me and remembered what my Mother instilled in me:  'Always talk things through.  Nothing comes of violence, Patrick.' 

But it seems my name was no longer Patrick.  They called me 'filth' because I still stunk of the war and battle I been to, because I hadn't had a chance to bath before they ambushed me at the road.

Yes, my capture had been planned.  


I looked around at my dungeon, smiling at my hard work.  The filthy water wasn't going to be drunk by me - no way! Instead I had found the rags of the last person who they had left here and scrubbed the floors, walls and ceiling of thie place.  And oh, how they glistened!


Now, did you know this dungeon was made of marble?  


All it needs is a fountain over in the corner to capture the morning light and fresh hay to take away that icky smell.