Fiction The Black Day (part 3)

Final Chapter!

The Red Day, Part 1
The Green Day, Part 2

Hope you like it, it has been a while since I have written.

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Every night I dreamt of slaughtering the lizardfolk, and nothing brought me joy more than going over the skirmish in my head. It hadn't been so bad in hindsight, I was alive, Hulk was alive, and many of them died at my hand. They would know about me, the ones that had run off would soon inform the rest of them, but I had done my best to cover my tracks. Days had come and gone, my strength had returned, and I would come up with a plan for vengeance.

Things flowed through my mind in those days, how I would kill them, the lizardfolk would kneel before me, plead with me, and I would slice their throat. Hadn't they done the same to me? They had destroyed my city, yet I had pleaded with them for sanctuary, to be an ally, and they had tried to kill me for it. I had been a bigger fool than Kayishen, there was no parley, not in this world. She was right to resist, and had died a better death than I would.

I would find them and I would kill them, the jungle looked different to me now, darker. It was no longer home, it was something that I hated, something to spite. I would tear out sections for the fun, to see it hurt. Sometimes I would hear a sudden sound, like a cold one, or an antok, something I that I used to recognise, and suddenly my mind would go black, I had to kill, or, or I had to run, I didn't know what I wanted. I could run, I could slay it, once I speared a rabhor and bathed myself in its blood, but nothing would settle me, nothing felt right. The lizardfolk had taken away my understanding of the world, so they would die at my hand, they would pay.

But it wasn't long was it? It wasn't long before you found me, or at least your minions did. Or did you see me there the whole time? That night that they came at me, those skinks that change colour, blowing poison like the cowardly curs that they are, I took a few down. How many was it? 6? 7? More?

I remember after that first waves of darts had hit me, and I had responded by charging into one who though he was hidden in the scrub, I felt the panic of them. With just my knife I slashed its throat, and stabbed the next one straight through the heart. A group of them barreled into me, I swung my knife wildly, and I connected. It was just me, no armour, no real weapon, yet I gave better than I got, didn't I? I remember taking an eye out, I remember connecting with each slash, did they die? I hope they did. I remember jamming my knife through a skinks armpit straight into the lung, but for some reason my knife got stuck, and then I didn't even have that. I remember jumping on the next one and trying to bite its throat out, did I succeed? It went blurry after that.

I guess you know the rest, your minions tied me up and brought me here. I was still savage for a while, trying to get free, trying to do anything, but I knew I was done for. I remember asking them what this was about, why they attacked me, three times now. Apparently it is all to do with Maylar, or Khorne is it? They told me he is wrong, that he is chaos. I like that – you slaughter an entire people, an entire city, under the name of your God and it is righteous? When I hunt animals and try to join your cause in the name of Maylar that makes me corrupt does it? The skink never explained this one to me fully, tell me what my children ever did to you?

So fine! You bring me here to execute me, and you ask me where I come from? Well let me tell you, you fat hideous frog, YOU made me! I lived and worshiped my God in a city, hunted animals until you arrived destroyed my people! I offered to join you and your lizardfolk attacked me! I tried to run and you found me, you snatched me in the night, and now you pass judgement on me.

Go ahead and kill me, I can take death, I can't take that self righteous look! Like I am something to be pitied, that I am something wrong, like I am mad, like I am evil!! In the next life I swear----

 

Cheers.

I really struggle to write in third person! So there you go, between us we have it covered.

Yeah I was (and am) a bit concerned that I made it all too obvious with his mad rant "I'm the good guy" but I figure I am better writing more stories and leaving this one as it stands, rather than trying to rewrite everything.

 

Very enjoyable read. I love that you made a character that wasn't evil for evil sake. Just a man's journey that, arguably, justifies his actions. It makes you look at the story and wonder, would I have done differently? I definitely see Lovecraftian influences in your work. He did a great job of showing the slippery slope of justifying actions. Nice to find others that enjoy his work. Well done.

 

The second person is probably feeling left out right now...

 

Or fifth person. Each sentence begins with "This guy told me what happened a friend of his was..."

Apologies to whatever comedian I ripped that off from.

Thanks for all the positive feedback everyone, I love hearing that people enjoyed me stories.

I have to say I love the concept of Turochlitan and the next idea that is forming will likely be set there too.

 

I apologize that it took me 2 days to get to reading the "Three Colours, Dead" series, but I was busy plotting revenge at the time.

My brain has two ways of dealing with lizardmen.

Option One is to take the lizards point of view and overlay human-like traits. This works, even if the motivations and purpose are very non-human.

eg. Grullt was agitated. He had concocted fourteen perfect batches of dart poison this day, but the fifteenth had come out yellow. It was just as deadly as the rest but it vexed him that he couldn't just add more Plebotinum, or indeed discard the whole batch. The glyphs which depicted the toxicant ritual did not allow for either course.

Just then Huhner appeared carrying the Mop of Sotek. "Yellow? Either some monkey peed in your vessel or you got the Great Plan mixed up with the other one. You know. The Bob one."

"Oh, go emoliate your head, Huhner." growled Grullt. "You are a vivid crested garlaxodon in the season of mists."

"It takes one to know one!" came the snappy reply.


Now, I have NO IDEA what they were talking about, but I know how they felt about it. (fun fact: I have no idea what my regular characters are doing either. I am just along for the ride.)


Option Two is to take the outsider's view. To them, lizards are inscrutable, alien, cold. They act according to their own unknown purpose and follow no predictable rules of conduct or ethics. The only thing you can rely upon is that they will protect their interests. Even if you don't know what their interests are.


Aside from obvious originality (except for all the Scalenexism - which is prohibited by law in MY country) and the well crafted and paced narrative, what grabbed me with "Three Colours" is that it is a story about a man who has internally consistent traits that I would 100% associate with lizards, and a bunch of lizards who respond with fear and hate - just like a human would.

Welcome to the upside down world of discomute!

I have a list of other colours (I think we can do without beige and possibly fuchsia) to help get you started on future works if you run dry after R.O.Y.G.B.I.V - I want to read more!




Side note: I saw that you had written into Scalenex's dreary universe and was going to complain that no one wanted to write into mine - and then I read some of the short story comp entries and realized that such homage is a double ended deralethi spirtle.

You may not know what I mean, but you can guess how I feel.

That's right, ambiguous.

 

Ooh that is an interesting observation, thanks for it and the compliments. We all start somewhere and I've been reading scale stories primarily, something about the corruption of a city in the middle of the jungle spoke to me.

I look forward to trying to write a story from a lizardmans first person, not sure how I will go.

 

Which is why no one wants to live in your country, Bob!

 

I really like how this ended. Almost a Lovecraftian rant of defiance. This was a great story that definitely makes you think.