Take Five . . . and Write

I do not believe there is currently a writing contest that is active.

So . . . for some fun . . . to hold us over . . . how about a collaborative
writing game as follows :

We pick a subject, like . . 1.) Suspense 2.) Love 3.) Horror 4.) Comedy etc.

Then, those who play the game, write a paragraph to the story using five
words given to them by the previous writer. These five words "must" be
incorporated into their paragraph and the continuing story so that it makes
sense.

I will go first. The first five words are: boat, cat, weather, house, legend.
I choose suspense as the first subject.

"As I walked along the rocky trail that led ever higher, a thick fog began to
roll in from across the bay, making visibility terribly difficult. The weather
appeared to be changing for the worse. Rain felt imminent as I hurried up
the dangerous path to the house and I quickened my pace even more
when I heard the cat meow off to my left. He probably wanted out of these
damp conditions just as much as I did. Poor thing. Legend had it that Leo,
(the cat), was a direct descendent of the first two cats brought to the
island over two hundred years ago by boat. He was so friendly he was
taken in and fed by everyone on the island whenever he so desired. As I
rushed up to the front door to let us both in . . . a light inside . . . was
extinguished. . . abruptly. Did I . . . have a visitor ? "

New words : shadow, aroma, knife, storm, ancient. Next ?

reply to post by SIEGE


Interesting idea.

Being of a cautious nature, I carefully opened the front door and inched my way in. I was immediately struck by the strange aroma drifting from the kitchen. Before I could take another step, Leo hissed and ran back outside.The kitchen door was ajar. I could make out the shadow of someone standing motionless. I took out my fishing knife and waited. The sound of the storm outside and the silence in the hallway harmonised perfectly, together yet separate. And in between, the ancient, primal dread that haunts us all held me completely still.

New words: bottle, music, hollow, stairs, primitive

Hmmm,

I moved silently towards the stranger then lept and stabbed at the same time!, catching the stranger below the breast, the only sound I heard was the hollow hiss of escaping air, I had stabbed a blow up doll! I looked toward the stairs as faint primitive music seemed to be coming from above, I moved forward quietly only to then stand on a discarded bottle and go crashing to the floor!

New words: Ajar, sheet, branching, twisted, carpet.

The music abruptly stopped, and I heard footsteps nearing the top
of the stairs. Holding my breath, I lay back on the carpet in the
dark and waited. Suddenly a sheet of white light lit up the room,
giving away my postion and blinding me at the same time. The
kitchen door, which before had been slightly ajar, now stood wide
open. I had dispatched the doll but something else now took its
place . . and it held the biggest butcher knife I had ever seen ! My
ankle had twisted during the fall, but I forced myself to stand, and
fight ! The branching tree outside now scrapped against the
window as the wind grew stronger, and I stood there like a mast
on a ship, looking first to the kitchen door, then to the top of the
stairs, then back again, trying to anticipate the greatest threat.

New words : fortitude, smell, sensuous, cliffs, soaking.

reply to post by SIEGE


I was caught between two intruders, throbbing pain shooting from my ankle. I looked at the puny knife in my hand and was weirdly reminded of the scene in Crocodile Dundee: "You call that a knife? *This* is a knife."
I could not help myself; I chuckled. If ever I possessed one grain of fortitude, in that moment, I lost it. The strange smell I'd noticed when I first came in wafted stronger in my direction but I could not identify it. It had a sensuous quality and was not unpleasant. I felt myself drifting. A gentle meow brought me back to my senses. I came to, soaking wet, outside my house. The storm had abated and the fog softly outlined the cliffs in the distance.

fur, meandering, mystery, soft, scream.

My hand by instinct was meandering towards my critical zone, I was soft,despite half formed recollections of my encounter with the two visitors that I had been squeezed like a sandwich between .

Leo sat curled above my frame his fur felt soft against my balding head,that is what I assumed at least, in reality the naked woman whose torso was straddled over my dome added only mystery to the shadowy memories of the encounter with the two strangers

I'm searching for the words here. The right words. Okay, . . . I
sat up and rolled the naked lady off my dome, taking care not to
use excessive force if I didn't need to. Turns out, I didn't need to . .
she was another doll . . one of those blow-up sexual type dolls . .
and she almost drifted away in the wind after being dislodged from
my frame. She was actually quite well-endowed in all the right
places for a doll, and I kind of felt sorry for her. Then I began to
laugh. Loud and hysterically. I sat there and laughed, in the mud,
and the blood, and the rain . . . until the shakes subsided. The
blood . . where did it come from ? Jumping to my feet, I ran over to
the front door . . and found Leo hanging just below the porthole.
Two knives held his lifeless body to the door, his blood dripping
down into a moving puddle that made its way over to where I had
regained my senses. What the hell was going on around here ?
And what was that smell . . the one that made me pass out ?

New words : isolation, plan, lighthouse, ferry, murder.

I took a deep breath and realised it was time to stop pussyfooting around. Suddenly, I felt like my hero, Telly Savalas, in Horror Express. I pulled the knives out of Leo's body in one swift move. The mangled corpse slid down the door and landed with a sickening squelch. I stepped over the threshold without wiping my shoes and walked resolutely into the darkened house, straight into the kitchen. The moonlight shone through the partially drawn curtains. I could see that it was empty. The whole house was quiet. The feeling of isolation was almost unbearable. I looked for the source of that smell, only a lingering memory now, and found nothing. I stared through the window, trying to formulate a plan of escape. The lighthouse was barely visible in the thick fog; the ferry to the mainland was long gone. I had to secure the house. I walked upstairs and found Jamieson, sprawled on the landing, dead. I wasn't even surprised when I saw that my own fishing knife had been used as a murder weapon.

copper, beach, lasting, rowing, caterwauling


[edit on 22-2-2010 by jeanvaljean]

Jamieson had been my best friend and business partner. It was
because of him that I was living here on the island in the first place.
This last house on the right, before you got to the lighthouse, was
ours, and it overlooked the rocky beach hundreds of feet below. It
was rustic but sturdy, and gave a pleasant lasting impression to
visitors and owners alike. We had started our own seafood
company just six weeks ago, specializing in fresh Abalone. The
waters around the island provided ideal conditions for harvesting
the seafood, and we only had to deliver it to the mainland to make
a tidy profit. They paid us $55.00 a lb. and sold it for $95.00 a lb. to
hungry tourists ! Such is business ! Jamieson and I had to work at
it, sometimes diving three or four times a week, but it was worth it.
Now, . . . now he was dead. Why ? Had it been that last dive, when
we were rowing out to our favorite spot, and spotted something
strange submerged in about forty feet of water, that maybe sent up
some red flags to someone ? I remember, it had been copper-
colored, approximately sixteen feet long, and about thirty-six inches
in diameter. We never really got a chance to truly investigate it
though, because some official-looking patrol boat with caterwauling
individuals made us feel uncomfortable in our own territory, and we
had headed back. Could that incident have started all of this ?

constable, Mary, discovery, unsavory, team

I rushed around the house, locking every door and window. There was no time to feel sorry for Henry and Leo. After all that had happened, I felt completely detached. I went about the task at hand with the focus of a highly-trained sniper. Once I was done, I sat silently in the moonlit kitchen and watched the front door. I thought of calling the constable but he was such a bumbling oaf he'd probably get us both killed. I heard a sound coming from the back door behind me. Someone was trying the handle with a clumsy insistence. I was on my feet in a split second, both knives drawn. But I needn't have worried. Mary, my ex-wife, had finally managed to open the back door and was standing there, staring at me in her trademark suspicious way, as if she knew some unsavoury truth about me. She told me the rescue team that had been searching the waters for a missing fisherman, had made an extraordinary discovery at our favourite diving spot.

deafening, violent, rocks, situation, mystified

The waves crashed seemed to violent for such a quiet night on the beach. The water glistened off the rocks as the waves came in.

I loved walking in the early hours of the morning. The feeling of nature had always left me mystified.

Continuing my daily run I found myself in a perculiar situation.

A hear a shot. A single, defeaning shot from behind me. My vision became blurry, and I could no longer stand. Falling to my knees the last I remember was having a man rummage through my pockets, and a warm icky feeling running down my back..

hatred, cigarette, forum, smile

~Keeper

reply to post by tothetenthpower


When I regained consciousness, I found myself lying on the dock. This being moved around without my consent was getting old. This time though, a pain like I never felt before was nailing me to the concrete. Every breath I tried to take took me back to my childhood, when the smallest sorrow felt like the end of the world. Now, I finally understood what old Jed meant when he'd shake his head in disgust at the TV, an everlasting, battered cigarette hanging from his lower lip: "did you ever get shot?", he'd ask me for the umpteenth time. "Do you really think you could get up and run around like that?" That old bastard was right. I could not move. I didn't want to. I just lay there, waiting for something, anything to happen. And it finally did. Mary came running out of nowhere with Jonesy, or whatever his name was, and for the first time since I'd caught them together at Mary's place, I felt no hatred. In fact, I found the strength to smile. Jonesy was a vet and he always had plenty of legal drugs on his person. For once, he'd have something to brag about on his bloody survival forum.

cove, artifact, undeterred, specious, reputation






[edit on 25-2-2010 by jeanvaljean]