Friday, May 1, 2020

Pandemic Drabble: The Last of Master, III

Part III of the weekly drabble (roughly 100-words) fiction, "The Last of Master"

RECAP: 
I. Hardy, the dog, eats his dead master (and some rats) and leaves his manor house. 

II. A girl finds the wounded dog in a gutter. Deciding he'd be more useful as a rat-hunter than as dog stew, she carries him away.

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The Last of Master: III

The dog died, and the girl made stew.

That night, wiry hair began sprouting along the girl's spine and fringing her ears. She slept all day, dreaming her nails and teeth were growing hard and sharp.

She woke, her nose twitching.
Did she smell a rat?
With a quick motion, she caught and ate dinner.

“Impressive,” she said, looking at her claws.

“Child’s play,” said the dog. 

“I’d like to register a complaint on behalf of rodents,” said the most recent rat.

The girl scratched her ear with her foot. “Hm,” she said. “Maybe we could grow potatoes instead.”

“Wonderful soil on my estate,” said Master. “My family has practiced nothing but the best organic methods for generations.”

“We’re all here then,” the girl said. She picked up the dog collar and buckled it around her neck. 
“Let’s go, Hardy.”

“I prefer to be addressed as Sir,” said Master.

“The name’s Jill,” said the rat.

“We’ll discuss our name on the way,” said the girl.
After crawling out of the basement window, the lone figure trotted down the street, keeping out of the full moon’s light.
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So.  That was trickier to write. How much do I need to spell out, and how much can the reader fill-in-the-blanks?
When I read it aloud, not everyone got it, but I think it's clearer read in print?


This episode is closer to 200 words, but I never meant to limit myself strictly--the short form was meant to encourage me to write any fiction at all.

As it gets more complicated, I wonder if I should start to plot a whole story... I've just been making it up piecemeal.

I don't know, though. The story keeps surprising me, and I fear that once I know what happens, I'll lose interest in writing it out! 
I'll keep feeling my way forward... 

And, We've got two more weeks of the stay-at-home order... Maybe I should write a little more, before I have to go back to work? Or wrap it up? 

8 comments:

  1. It's definitely surreal. I like it! I've found in my professional writing that readers are usually smarter than I fear they are and can figure things out for themselves. :)

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  2. STEVE: Thanks!

    Yeah, readers are smart, but it takes a good writer to know how much info is too much, and how much is too little.
    I can't trust that I know that (especially in fiction, which I don't write).

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  3. no more info needed, It's really good! I loved reading this and it took me where you would like the reader to go, I am sure! Made my day, my week...I will read it many more times and get a thrill every time. Now I want you to never go back to work- stay home and write forever! I am that selfish!

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  4. Such a great ending and it satisfies my need for everyone to have survived in some form! I can just picture the creature going down the street.

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  5. ***COMMENT FROM Susan S:

    That third segment of The Last of Master is my favorite, the elisions make it into a hybrid of poetry and prose (maybe echoing the hybrid character?).
    It’s also the anti “A Boy and his Dog”.


    to SUSAN:
    Thanks, Susan!

    Good catch! --"A Boy and His Dog" came to my mind too!
    I only saw it once when I was a teenager and hated it . . . enough so that it must have been an influence!

    In fact, this whole thing is a pastiche of influences----
    Werewolf in London, Charlotte's Web (!?), Pippi Longstocking, all those PBS manor-house mysteries + every post-apocalyptic thing I've ever read...
    AND bink's wire-haired fox terriers!

    But it's all coming together new in me, which is a lot of fun---I'm liking writing fiction.

    The only thing I can't place is the rat named Jill, whom I LOVE!!!
    Maybe she's me.

    Ciao! XO F

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  6. LINDA SUE: Wow, thanks! I'm super glad to hear that people are not confused---I thinking (hoping) now that it was reading it aloud outside that created fuzziness.

    Hey, I LOVE your plan for me to stay at home and write forever!


    SARAH: OOoh, I'm glad you can see the new lifeform going down the street.

    And I, too, didn't want anyone to die---and the rat death-rate especially was way too high!

    BUT, I also didn't want it to be like what I hated in Harry Potter:
    no one dies. (Well, they do, but none of the big 3.)
    So my subconscious came up with this work-around.
    Thank you, subconscious.

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  7. “Organic methods” — I laughed there.

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  8. MICHAEL: Yay! I thought that was funny too--sort of like "artisanal curation".

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