My stay is also shaping up to be a little longer than I anticipated but I don't want to go two days without posting something. And something more than "lol, no posts because I'm stupid."
Now, I did just see Side Effects and thought perhaps I could write up a post on my thoughts for that movie. However, after discussing it with my friend, I really don't see much point. At the end of the day, Side Effects is created to be solely entertainment with little thought or care for creating a believable world, characters, themes or narrative. Thus, any discussion about the unbelievability of the characters and the ludicrousness of the plot is a waste. The creators had no intention of making a sound story and deep analysis is really just a waste of anyone's time.
So, suffice to say I wasn't a big fan of it but given it's premise (the possibility of a drug inducing someone to commit murder) was rather stupid anyway. I would have forgiven the movie that small element if it decided to be a more scathing criticism of the American Healthcare System, but it is very conservative in its views and by the end not only is the system itself not at fault but also it was the "wicked woman" who was bringing sin/evil/trouble to the unwitting and innocent male.
So it's both highly favourable to a corrupt system and stupidly patriarchal in its social views. I much preferred Seven Psychopaths but that movie obviously won't do nearly as well.
Instead, here's the beginning scribbles of what I'm working on currently. Forewarning, it is in early alpha and extremely rough so don't cut yourself on the edges.
---------------Break ---------------
Cry of the Glasya-Labolas
The court thundered. The stone walls
shook beneath the tempest of violins and drums as the commanding keys
of the piano wove masterfully through the piece. But even the clarion
of the trumpets and the gentle weep of the harp sounded little more
than background chatter. For there was but one sound that cut through
the minstrel band like the stampede of an unstoppable cavalry charge.
And it was produced by the smallest,
least intimidating creature Keirn had ever seen.
She stood between the thick stone
pillars of the throne hall. Dwarfed on all sides by the yawning
arches of the audience chamber for the ancient keep. Even the thick
tapestries and heralds hanging from the walls couldn't dampen the
pelting voice roaring from those thin vocal chords. A single,
unassuming woman stood unmoving upon a tiny wooden block.
But while her feet appeared rooted,
her arms twisted with each haunting symbol that erupted forth from
her with a greater force then a storm whipped tide. It seemed inhuman
the sounds that she twisted from deep within her breast. Had Keirn
not been standing there to experience it himself, he would never have
believed it to be true.
And neither could the assembled court.
Every onlooker watched in stunned
muteness as the foreign words of this incredible singer drowned out
all other sounds and thoughts from their minds. There was no doubt in
Keirn's mind. This was the most beautiful and elegant aria he had
ever heard. Granted, he'd never heard one before, but even the Duke
Hasselbach sat riveted upon the edge of his stolen throne in rapt
entrancement.
And just when Keirn thought it
couldn't more impressive, a sudden string of notes he'd never
imagined singable came bursting forth from her, directed right down
the hall at the raised lord and his gathered attendants by two thin
waving arms.
There was but one soul in the entire
chamber that seemed unmoved by the piece.
Derrek Gungric, Keirn's closest
companion and minstrel had his back turned upon the performance and
busied himself with a nearby candlestand. Through sheer apparent
boredom, he passed the soft flame from one candle to the next,
letting the wax drip in thick rivers down the sides until it pooled
in the small holders.
“How can you not like this?” Keirn
whispered. “I hate your music the most and even think this is damn
good.”
“Heard it before.”
“Not like this,” Keirn said. There
was no way in this life or the next anyone had heard something like
this.
There was a collective gasp as the
young singer stepped from her perch. She turned, addressing the
courtiers to the sides and the guards standing before the massive
barred doors. It was impossible to know what she sang but the
delivery gave the briefest impression that it was directed at you
alone before she broke the spell and turned to the next face.
It was impossible to look away. Until
Keirn heard a strange rustling and quickly scanned around for the
source.
Having exhausted his attention with
the candles, it seemed that Derrek was now busying himself with
darkening a pair of thick glasses with a large piece of charcoal.
“What are you doing?!” Keirn
hissed, slipping as unobtrusively to his side.
“I can't watch this any longer,”
Derrek said.
“So you're going to blind yourself!”
“That's the plan.”
Keirn stood momentarily mute.
“We're suppose to be guarding the
Duke!”
“So?”
“How are you going to do that if you
can't see?”
“Shhhh!”
Keirn turned to the intruding voice
only to be greeted with Jeremiah's stern face. The larger man
motioned towards the singer with a look of impatience. Keirn cast a
glance back at the Duke who appeared to be completely oblivious to
the disruption. He motioned to Derrek as explanation for his actions
but Jeremiah merely waved his hand dismissively.
Keirn turned back to the stubborn
minstrel. He'd already completely blacked out one eye. He sighed,
turning from his friend back to the performance. Keirn would just
have to settle with being extra attentive to make up for the lack of
eyes from the bard.
Not that there wasn't an already
impressive show of force in the court today. Trained archers lined
the galleys and four guards stood watch over every entrance. But the
show of force was easily forgotten beneath the elegant woman before
them.
Keirn then felt a tugging at his
sleeve.
“What?!”
“Do you know where Kait left her
bags?”
Keirn leaned in close to his friend as
the singer hit another stretch of impossible notes.
“Why don't you ask her?”
“She looks like she's having fun.”
“And I'm not?”
“You've already missed the overture.
Besides, I'm doing you a favour by missing this atrocious
performance.”
Keirn sighed.
“What do you need now?”
“The leg bones from dinner.”
“Of course you- what?”
“From the swine. You know, you said
yourself it was the finest you'd eaten in weeks.”
“I'm well aware of what I ate!”
“SHHHHHHHH!”
Keirn grabbed his friend's dainty
wrist and pulled him from the throne dais. Once he was sure he was
out of earshot from the duke, he turned upon the impossible delicate
features of his friend.
“First, why in the blazes would you
need those. Second, why are they in my sisters bag?!”
“Probably to finish her chime.”
Keirn merely blinked at his
incomprehensible friend.
“You're impossible sometimes.”
“So do you know where she left
them?”
“I believe she was requested to
leave them in the guard quarters just outside the hall.”
Suddenly, there was a pause in the
vocals as the instruments swelled in the break.
Derrek frowned.
“I'll have to get them later.”
He then began removing his shirt.
Keirn grabbed his hands.
“Would you stop!”
“The wax should be ready by now,”
Derrek said, slipping his hands free and tossing his jerkin aside.
“Look, you may be jealous of another
bard getting the lead performance for the Duke but that doesn't give
you the right to ruin this. Especially when we haven't even been
compensated yet!”
Derrek paused with his belt in his
hand. The woman's voice burst forth and he dropped his pants.
“Probably best to do it now,” he
said, shaking his boots free. Keirn growled, snatching for the
discarded trousers as the bard quickly hopped to the candlestand in
nothing but his linen braies. There, the blonde man dipped his
fingers into the cooling pools of wax and plugged them deep into his
ears. As Keirn rounded on him with trousers held menacingly in one
hand and the belt in the other, the bard danced effortlessly about
his wailing arms before slipping behind him. There he plunged his
fingers into Keirn's ears and the young man could immediately feel
the hardening wax plug his ear canals and mute out all but the
faintest echoes of the lingering song.
Keirn rounded on his friend, feeling a
familiar frenzy drawing in his chest. But just as he was about to
wield his friend's belt as a whip, he caught a sudden shift of motion
on his periphery.
He turned, watching as the Duke's rapt
attention turned to that of sheer horror. The honour guard standing
by his side merely gaped in fear, their crisp halberds dropping from
frozen fingers. Keirn felt the motion instead of hearing anything in
that dampening silence. All about him, a perceptible change had
overtaken the crowd. The courtesans and guests seemed to draw back
from the room, pressing against the walls before turning and fleeing
towards the doors.
But all entrances to the throne room
had been sealed by request of the Duke. The mob merely pounded
useless against the wood.
Keirn wasn't entirely sure what it was
that drew his attention back to the centre of the room. But as he
turned his face he could feel a sudden burning wave of heat wash over
him. And what he saw caused his heart to stop.
There, standing upon the raised wooden
step was a towering horror. Keirn wasn't even sure what it was.
The
creature wore the body of a human, bare chested but with thick irons
wrapped about its arms and dangling from large wrists. The chains
pulled taut as great iron collars shackled monstrous canine creatures
that snapped about the monster's thighs. But both man and beasts were
much larger than anything... human.
The creature raised its head, a burnt
stag skull resting upon its sinewy shoulders. From the darkest pits
of its sockets burned an undying red light like stoked embers. A
dented and torn scale mail skirt hung limply about the creature's
waist, coated in dried blood and flecked with rotted pieces of fur
and flesh that gave a nauseating scent of death that radiated from
the monster.
Finally, a pair of great eagle wings
sprouted from the creature's back. But these weren't majestic
appendages by bloody and broken masses of torn skin and protruding
bone. Great splotches of featherless skin were stretched over the
bloodied heavenly remnants.
Through the thick wax, Keirn could
hear the hollowest echoes of screams.
The creature raised its arms and the
four front hounds bound forward. The chains about its forearms
unravelled as the beasts bore across the flagged floor faster than
any worldly predator. Before anyone could react, they had descended
upon the petrified Duke, curved claws longer than daggers tearing
through cloth and flesh in mere seconds.
All the Duke's guards merely watched
in unmoving fear as their liege was torn to shreds before them.
Keirn felt something strike the back
of his head and he turned to see Derrek practically naked and staring
uselessly at a pillar through his darkened glasses. The minstrel made
a gnawing gesture then shrugged his shoulders.
“Now's not the time!” Keirn
shouted.
Then he realized Derrek couldn't hear
him. The feminine man merely smacked him again and repeated the
gesture.
But the distraction had shaken Keirn
from his inaction and he could feel the pressing need to do something
and quickly. He grabbed his friend by the wrist and pulled him away
from the throne towards the guard room. He didn't know what the bard
was planning with the bones but perhaps he knew some sorcery to deal
with this terror.
Course, Keirn had no idea how he was
going to get through the frightened mob.
Yet, as Keirn hurried towards the side
entrances, he noticed the gathered audience turning almost as if they
were directed. They all peered back to the centre of the room where
Keirn could hear only the faintest of whispers mingling with the
ravaged slobbers of those great hounds.
Whatever distraction beheld the
others, it made pushing past them with his blind, naked friend in tow
easier. Keirn descended on the door, trying the handle and feeling it
catch against it's latch.
“It's locked!” he cried.
Uselessly.
This deafness thing was going to take
some getting used to. Keirn turned to Derrek for more guidance but
the bard merely repeated the bone-gnawing gesture.
The temperature in the room noticeably
rose and Keirn could feel sweat beginning to bead upon his neck. He
raised his hand to wipe it away and noticed a curiously change seem
to overtake his neighbours.
The attendants clutched at their ears,
pressing back against the walls or collapsing against the floor. Some
appeared to writhe in agony while others drew whatever item or weapon
they had at hand. Thus, armed they struck out madly about them,
hitting and stabbing whatever their weapons found purchase in.
And in this monstrous crowd, Keirn's
sister was still. With stilling heart, Keirn realized she could still
be standing at the Duke's side where those beastly hounds still
feasted. Keirn began to push his way through the crowd.
He'd barely taken a few steps before
he felt someone his wrist grabbed. He turned to see Derrek still standing with one arm raised to gnaw. But there was something in his
posture that seemed to suggest a great sense of urgency. It was hard
to pinpoint what, but something about how he held himself seemed to
indicate that if they had the bones then they would be able to get
their friends.
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