Writing Contest #2: Together

Writing Contest #2: Together

It’s the season of giving and forgiving, warmth inside and cold outside, stuffing our faces with food and listening to more seasonal music than we know what to do with. But do we do all this alone? Unless you’re a real hermit, of course not! And that’s why the theme for December’s Writing Contest is ‘Together.’

What we want you to do is write a short story about togetherness, or your character’s perception/lack of it. We’re not going to impose a word count upon you, but keep in mind that we have to read and judge all entries within a reasonable timespan. Entries can be submitted starting now, and we will close the submission window on December 31st and attempt to have our judging done by January 15th.

You may change your entry as many times as you wish, but incomplete entries cannot be considered for judging, and what has been posted to this thread on December 31st is final. All entries must be posted to this thread. The exact number of winners will be decided based on the number of entrants.

Prizes:
Winner: 2 levels and 4/5 of a weapon level for a character of your choice, and a special extra surprise...
Runners-up: 1 level and 2/5 of a weapon level for a character of your choice.

herp a derp watch me fail gaize

A Winter Walk (open) A Winter Walk (close)

Noah clutched his cloak and looked around him. Brisk morning air chilled and tickled his face. Ordinarily it would be only an ordinary winter day.

But now... there was an air of tension. People were being told to alert authorities if they saw anything suspicious, and production of supplies was being kicked up. Ylisse's Exalt was in the hands of their king. War was coming. It was only a matter of time.

He supposed that he should have been happy; as a freelance tactician his services would likely be in high demand very soon. What's more, this was the perfect chance to take revenge on Ylisse. It had ravaged Plegia, stolen his home and his parents from him; all that was left was him and the tattered ruins of the town.

But instead of the fear or infectious patriotism of the populace (especially the young), Noah Garod felt something akin to disapproval and doubt. It was true that he held little love for Ylisse, for their barbarous crusades... but something in this smelled rotten to him. The current Exalt had done no wrong to them; in truth she had probably been most unreasonable in her numerous attempts to parley. Noah knew that King Gangrel was a domineering sort, and never had he approached Ylisse without some sort of angle; his adoptive father, a wyvern rider, had hesitantly informed him of that. So why would the ruler of their hated enemy so persistently answer the call for negotiations? Surely it would've been easier to simply declare war and be done with it.

Noah never vocalized these thoughts, of course. He felt as though there were no place for people like him. He was no Ylisse sympathizer; those beasts had taken from him everything, and only an agent of Plegia's military had saved him, taken him in. Even before that, he was a soldier's son; working hard to be strong enough to defend his country. But at the same time he knew that this was not the correct path; that this was not the army he knew before. In the last war, the army was a shield for the people, for the nation; it had served faithfully, fighting and dying to protect the people. Now? Now they fought maliciously, intent on killing and avenging their prior losses.

He could not deny that there was a part of him that agreed, that bayed for Ylissean blood.

But he grudgingly resisted it. If they continued in this manner, then it was the people who would suffer. He knew how he hated Ylisse; he was, as a survivor of a ravaged town, a symbol of the mutual enmity between the two countries. How ironic it was that he of all people would be so averse to military action between the two. But he also knew that though his hatred may never have died, the next generation would be born without such prejudice; in them, perhaps, was the hope for the future. But instead of raising them, everyone was focused on killing each other, on widowing their enemy's children, on inflicting suffering upon suffering. Mankind was linked; it had a choice of whether to live together or die together; as things were, it was almost certainly selecting the second.

Noah frowned as he watched a family walk down the street, a laughing little girl begging for pastries. That was what they should be fighting to protect, not to destroy. But so few people saw it that way; they never stepped to think about exactly what their "justice" would entail. It was for little reasons like this that he could hold his hate at bay. To see the bonds between people flourish and thrive... that was worth turning the other cheek for, he thought.

But it occurred to him that paradoxically, perhaps the only one to agree with his thoughts was Exalt Emmeryn. His adoptive father? Certainly not. He was honor-bound, besides. Any of those he had met when traveling? No, probably not; he knew that most of them preferred not to fight, but they were all entirely capable of doing so and most likely willing to do so if Ylisse came knocking. And the king and his court was entirely out of the question; they were those who had begun the unrest in the first place, after all. They all would probably hang together, though their reasons were disparate; for king and country, for money, for survival, for any number of things... but they would all band together to fight.

And what of Ylisse? He could hardly go and intimate his thoughts to them. Were he to go on a mission of peace it was very likely he would be killed on sight. If not by Ylisse, then certainly by the country he would have betrayed by doing so. What's more, he was sure that the sentiments of animosity were not exclusive to Plegia, especially with the absence of Emmeryn. If nothing else, that nation loved its ruler above all. There were none who would not lay down arms and lives for her sake, and now she was no longer here to stop them. They, too, whether eagerly or regretfully, would battle with a united front.

Noah shook his head sadly. He supposed that such unity on a grand scale was admirable. But at the same time, it endangered the unities of lower orders... and he was entirely alone in thinking of it.

Always Together (open) Always Together (close)

Alaine hugged her cloak as close to her as she could, cradling what was in her other hand to her breastplate. She peered around the tree, knowing something was out there. Some one. He'd be coming after her. She retreated back behind the trunk, then peered around the other side. Soon. He'd come for it soon.

Alaine moved to the next trunk large enough around to hide her. Looking the way she had come by, the woman began to peer through the other trunks. The underbrush was thankfully covered, but that also made tracking her easy.

Then she heard it. Funth funth funth. The sound of footsteps in snow. She peered around the trunk she was backed up against. Funth funth funth. Closer now. Quickly Alaine twisted around to the other side of the trunk, and she saw it. Footprints in the snow that were not hers, maybe thirty feet out. Funth. "HA!" Alaine stepped out immediately, and then threw the object she had cradled to her chest.

Jacob's snowball, about eight inches across, sailed past the mercenary, but Alaine hit the surprised fighter square in the face with hers. "Ha HA! Yourself," the mercenary triumphantly planted her feet and crossed her arms.

"Okay, okay, you win! Pthuh pthuh... Ptew! Naga's arse that's cold!" he groaned, spitting out snow. Some had even gone up his nose. The fighter kept squeezing his nose to melt the ice stuck up there.

"Looks like I've turned the score around since this morning," Alaine smiled, counting in her head. "Seven to three now. Care to go again?"

"No, no, you win. I owe you a favor. What do you want?" he capitulated.

"I'll call it in later. First we need to get ready. A wealthy patron of ours that lives relatively close is having a party, and since we've scratched his back a good couple times," Alaine smiled as she helped her lieutenant up, "He's invited us as guests of honor, provided we can behave. I thought you, James, Terris, and I would go."

"And Osney?" Jacob asked, raising his eyebrow as they started walking back home, their boots making the funth sound with each step they took. If Jacob was her right hand, then Alaine's left would have surely been their grumpy armored friend. He normally accompanied them most anywhere, or prepared the way ahead of them.

"He's in charge of the fort. I asked him first, but he declined, said he didn't like the guy," Alaine said, sounding somewhat flippant. "If any idiot, and I can think of a few, tries to take my fort while I'm gone, they've got another thing coming while Osney's in charge of defenses."

"Shame the siblings can't go," Jacob said.

"Ah, they can't act that sophisticated," the mercenary snorted. "Besides, they'd get drunk and say too much." She'd thought this over. "Besides, this way, the two girls can share their brother. And Torvald can have Verana for a while. Perhaps he'll even realize her feelings for him."

"Oh, yeah. Wouldn't want to bring him with us," Jacob mused, wincing that the trouble their priest'd bring them.

"And I would not save him from it. Even if I did, I'd beat him bloody when we got home," Alaine announced. Torvald was an incorrigible lecher. What Verana saw in him, none of them knew.

Presently they had passed out of the forest and were coming upon the front door. "Be ready in an hour. That's when the carriage will arrive." Alaine passed into the gate, up to the top of the fort, and then into her room. Jacob followed her through the gate, and made his way to his own room.

And hour later, Alaine, wrapped in a black, fur-lined cloak, stood next to James, in red, Terris, in purple, and the towering Jacob, in brown. Theirs were also fur-lined. The coachman knocked, and Alaine filed out with Jacob, with James and Terris after them.

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Terris was unusually talkative at the party, having conversations with people she'd only met with a few times, or sometimes having never met before. She looked good, as well, her black hair done up in a bun and a with a very regal-looking dress that Alaine herself had only seen a few times.

James was a part of her conversations as well, essentially being her arm candy for the evening. He was dressed sharply, shaven, and had combed his hair neatly.

Jacob wore his nicest shirt and clean pants, and had polished some of his armor and worn it. He stood or sat near Alaine. He wasn't too good with the rich, but he could hold conversation. His boss was approached often as well.

Alaine herself was wearing a regal black dress, a gift from the host, and had elected to wear a more revealing eyepatch as opposed to her typical bandages. Alaine kept a glass of wine handy when she felt the need for a segue into a new topic. It saved her grief several times that night. She also tried a drink she'd never heard of before; egg nog. It was an interesting alcoholic beverage, but after that, she went back to her wines.

Eventually, their host had, after the excessive and well-cooked dinner, brought out a band and cleaned off the dance floor. Those that still had the sobriety (to be fair, there was a lot of wine) and the desire, quickly filed to the floor.

Alaine found herself dancing with Jacob at the point when the music became slow and sad. The drawling notes, sweet and sorrowful in their poignance, brought a tear to the mercenary's eye. She pressed herself into the mass of muscle that was her lieutenant. "Alaine? Alaine, are you okay?"

"Promise me...," she whispered as their slow dance moved them lazily across the dance floor. She was feeling... ephemeral. Fleeting. Exceptionally sensitive to the notion of her own mortality. The shock from all her near-death experiences on the job echoed through her being, shaking her to her core. "Promise me... that we'll be together. That I'll never... I'll never have to see my family leave me."

It was the wine. The goddamn wine! She tried to get angry at it, but her sadness at the notion was overpowering. Everything seemed to be so... so worthless. What was the point?

"I promise."

His strong arms pressed her close as she felt her tears well up and spill over. Her partner guided them off the dance floor and held her as she let out her wine-addled emotions. She thankfully did not sob, and so did not draw as much attention to herself as she could have, but some people did notice.

"I promise you, Alaine, I will never leave. If nothing else, I can swear, we'll be together until the end of time."

She sighed, her voice soft again, "Together."

Derpage on my part, everyone. The deadline for this is not December 30th- it's December 31st. I've changed the first post to reflect this.

I should post a heads-up: If we do not get new entries before Tuesday, I will have to cancel this contest. We cannot in good conscience choose a winner out of two entries- only one of which is even complete. I will lock this thread on midnight, December 31st. Again, if by that time we do not have more entries, judging will NOT occur and NO prizes will be awarded.

Belated but not less final because of it: Due to a lack of interest, this contest is cancelled. No judging will occur and no prizes will be awarded. I thank Unnamed Dude and Knight of G for trying and apologize for the inconvenience.