Tuesday, August 9, 2016

A Mistake of Mammoth Proportions

When I last delved into old stories, I mentioned a story I started about an island inhabited by living mammoths. That sounds dumb every time I say it,  but there you have it. I was going through my old notebooks and papers the other day, and I found it. So I'm going to share it with you.
 
I have a tendency to set stories in the current year unless there's some specific reason to put it in the past or the future. My notes indicate that the prologue takes place in 2000, while the story proper is in 2002, so it's reasonable to assume that it was written sometime between those dates. So would have been 12-14. Keep that in mind because this is awful.

So what I think was supposed to happen was that there were some people who crashed on this island, in 2000, and then there were some others who go there in 2002 , for reasons that are no longer clear to me. Anyway, here goes.
Prologue
It was cold. Even though it was August, it was below freezing in the Arctic Ocean. Had it been in the Caribbean, it would still have been frigid, due to Ferdinand Pizarro's mood.
He was just returning to his Alaskan lodge from an unsuccessful hunting excursion on Canadian Ellesmere Island. He hated being unsuccessful. He glared coldly at his assistant, Milton Brady, on whom he blamed all his misfortunes.
"Pilot!" he hollered suddenly. "Does you stupid, useless, junkyard heap of a plane have a heater?"
"It's on!" the pilot answered, tired of Pizarro's constant complaining. Pizarro muttered a few choice words.
A sudden jolt interrupted Pizarro's grumbling. The plane banked to the right, sending people and parcels about. Brady screamed in a rather girlish fashion, covering his eyes.
"What is the deal?!" the pilot inquired of the air as he fought to regain control. "Nothing works!"
"We're going to die!" Brady shrieked. "We'll be smashed to smithereens! Horribly mangled! Eaten by God knows what!"
This seemed to be the case as the plane spiraled out of control, towards a little green blob in the seas that was not to be found on any map.
Closer and closer came the blob, now apparently an island. The plane spun and twisted, heading right for the western edge.
I then had a couple of snippets (that's what they're labeled as). One is from later in the prologue, and the other is from an early chapter in the story proper. I know it's early because they still haven't gone anywhere, and it seems to be introducing characters.
Here's the piece of the prologue. I'm not sure why I switched from calling the characters by their last names to calling them by their first names, but I did. I actually think this part was written before the first part.
The ground shook. Something was coming. Ferdinand saw something huge between the trees. Then it came into full view.
"A mammoth!" Ferdinand exclaimed. The fact that this was an extinct creature and he was seeing it alive failed to make an impact in his brain. All he could think was, "This will make a fine trophy for my wall!" But his gun, where… "Milton! Fetch me the elephant gun and some ammunition!"
Milton hurried back to the plane. Ferdinand was so intent on watching the beast only 85 yards away, he never saw the larger, closer version until it was too late. The prehistoric monolith charged. It was over before Ferdinand realized what happened. Milton returned with the ammunition, to see the lifeless form of his employer, impaled by a monstrous curved tusk.
I'm not going to share the other snippet, because it is really bad. And super confusing without the help of my equally stupid notes. I had some really dumb characters in mind. 13 year old me had some questionable ideas.

I found some other stories while I was digging through my old notes. Some of them I don't even remember writing. There was a paper I apparently wrote for English that concludes with "Never trust a politician, or anyone named Chesterfield Snapdragon McFisticuffs," or something similarly ludicrous. I was a weird kid. Now I'm a weird adult. Regardless, I might share some more of these Tales from the Archives, when I don't have anything else to talk about.
See you all Friday.

1 comment:

  1. That is my name Chesterfield, Snapdragon Mcfisticuffs and am very trustworthy accept when I am lieing or yet awaiting for the truth to become true maybe I believe it is not a lie there for my truth is real and their for is it really a lie or a belief I am sharing with others from someone else's belief of a story they believed to be told by another man who word is as sturdy as an oak but what they did not say is how many twists and turns were in the branches to get to this truth so why not trust a man who's word is solid as an oak would I lie or is just a truth yet to be made true so do you believe in Mr. mcfisticuffs can he make his story true how long is it a lie if becomes true and no one is the wiser does not every child wish on a star and when it comes true do they thank that star or believe even more in that wish and then they continue to wish and it all becomes true smoke and mirriors spoken like a true politician and yes that is my answer to nuclear warfare no more questions.

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