Two snippets to Prompts

[aldersprig]

Otherwise known as: I had to make 444 words on #4thewords to keep up my streak, and I didn't want to write anything else...

First to @dahob's prompt here and second to Rix's prompt here

On some level, it was a fascinating study in closed genetic populations. This little island had been cut off from everything else since the End Wars. The bridges had been blown, the waters had become impassible, and a series of bad explosions of magic meant that most people didn’t even remember that it existed.

If a Finder hadn’t targeted it as holding useful resources, it might have gone another seventy-five years before anyone noticed it was there.

As it was, the island had a small population that seemed entirely to consist of rabbit-Change fae. They were very rabbity, more so than any other rabbit-Changes the team had ever seen. And they were very definitely at war.

As far as the team could tell, the striped-looking rabbit people were fighting with the pointed-like-a-Siamese-cat rabbit people over territory rights on the ruins of the single large town in the center of the island. It had gotten quite violent, from the blood and the bodies and the missing limbs, and they hardly noticed the team’s arrival.

Since the team’s goal was at the side of the island, not the center, they were tempted to just let the rabbit gang war continue, but, seriously, there was too much interesting information to be garnered, so they grabbed one of each and hauled them off to get some information.

By the time they left, they’d identified five of each breed - turned out there were sub-breeds - to kidnap, and had even done a little bit of peace-making in the gang war. There was much more to be had from this tiny island, but they had their own war to fight first.

---

“Seriously, what are you doing?”

The Mara had purple-red wings and looked to be almost as short as Luke. Male, golden-skinned and golden-haired, they stooped into a dive and landed directly in front of Conrad. “You call this a battle plan?”

Conrad looked the Mara up and down. “I’m sorry, you are…?”

He was in no mood to put up with pureblood bullshit. His wife and kids were half a country away, where he couldn’t protect them, and he was fighting would-be gods with the weapons at hands, which might as well be sticks and stones.

“Piotr, called Catapult. You need better weapons.” The Mara bowed deeply. “Just so happens, I’m a weapon.”

Comments

[kelkyag]

<curious> What were the prompts? And whose team is that in the first snippet?

Nits:
"from the bloody and the bodies and the missing limbs": bloody -> blood
Needs tags.

[aldersprig]

The first prompt was Hob’s Rabbit Gang War and the second was Rix’s “An older Mara, not Luke, critiquing a cy’Luka?

Once it became Conrad - from Addergoole: TOS - the rest fell into place.

It needs all sorts of tags n stuff. I was very tired last night and forcing myself to write 444 words was what I had for juice.

[kelkyag]

<warm fuzzies and fusses>

Streaks can be fun and motivating and all, but it's okay to let them go, too. Sleep and other health and real life things are important, too.

[aldersprig]

Hundred. Days. I got to a hundred days.

Also. :-D I made it.

[kelkyag]

Done now? :}

[aldersprig]

When I get to 365 days I get awesome wings. :-D

But I futzed through 444 words today and I think I can get un-burn-out tomorrow.

Also, MARKED gets me through 500 words :-)

[kelkyag]

"I'm not an addict. I can quit any time I want to."

[aldersprig]

*Snort*

I’m an addict.

4thewords is just better for my mind and well-being than, say, Farmville.

Or Civ.

[kelkyag]

Oh dear gods Civ halp ...

[aldersprig]

Speaking of “I can stop any time”, I don’t want to stop knitting to to go bed.

[kelkyag]

The yarn I can at least justify for a little while before bed as good for winding down ...

Umm. <guilty> <also very bad at going to bed>

[aldersprig]

Usually it’s ‘cause I’m roleplaying that I lose track of time...

[sauergeek]

I've found I have to set the kitchen timer -- the one that never shuts up and repeats its alarm every ten seconds -- to remind me that it's time to stop playing Skyrim and do something else.

And yet I'm considering getting Fallout 4, and getting impatient for the next standalone Elder Scrolls installment.

[aldersprig]

Htrrm, Kitchen timer might do it!

[aldersprig]

(oh, and I didn’t determine the team because I didn’t feel like coming up with names <.<)

[thnidu]

• purpler-red
> Arrr! Too many of 'em, matey! Get t' yer bunk early the nite, will ye? Ye got to take care o' yersel'!

[aldersprig]

*giggle*

[sauergeek]

I think I initially misread the second segment's fourth paragraph. I thought the lead "he" -- same person throughout -- was the unnamed Mara rather than Conrad. It wasn't until I re-read a few times that I realized that that reading made no sense, and that "he" probably meant Conrad.

Given the unknown Piotr/Catapult dropping out of the sky and offering to help Conrad, what's Piotr's angle on this? I can see joy of the fight, or evening sides, but I think both are implausible.

[aldersprig]

Well, this was meant to be set in the middle of the Fae Apoc war, which would definitely give Piotr a “let’s win” angle.

[sauergeek]

I'm curious about what the unspecified resources are that originally brought the team to the island. I'm even more curious about how the rabbits had missed whatever the resources are. The information seems like a bonus, unless the Finder meant a specific rabbit or group of rabbits living at the indicated place.

Well-placed kidnappings, much like well-placed assassinations, can put a serious crimp in an organization. I have to wonder if taking out leaders on both sides could result in peace, or if there's something more fundamental involved.

[aldersprig]

Those are good questions! Any suggestions for answers? :D

Taking the leaders is probably at least a good start.

[sauergeek]

I have no idea if there are things that fae would want which ordinary humans would have no -- or at least insufficient -- interest in. For all I know, certain varieties of granite are precious, and there's an old long-closed quarry of one of those variants on that corner of the island.

Given the unqualified use of "resources", I'd expect something tangible, usually attached in some way to the ground: crops, something wild, or minerals.

It's implausible the rabbits have overlooked their own crops, and would likely object if a bunch of outsiders showed up to try to take them. Given the behavior of this team, it's also unlikely the team would've tried.

It's unlikely the rabbits would have missed usefully exploitable wood or other wild-growing thing like a berry bramble, unless it's astonishingly inaccessible. (Maybe on top of a granite outcropping, where a flyer can reach it, and a levitator fetch it down.) That said, if they have sufficient wood or food, they may just not have exploited it yet.

The same goes for minerals, but there it's more believable that the rabbits wouldn't yet have found a deposit of whatever if it's entirely underground. If the deposit is under a geologic cap of some sort it may have never been discovered at all, even pre-Apocalypse. So of the usual concepts of resources, my vote would be some sort of useful mineral: precious metals, clay, easily smelted iron, gemstones, or the like.

But there is one more possibility would fit the word in this 'verse: a long-closed landfill, especially one that was in use before recycling came into substantial use. The landfill could contain all sorts of usefully retrievable stuff mixed in with all the gross stuff. It would look like a moderately sloped hill with a flat top. If the vent pipes have gone missing, the ground would likely not be stable (and potentially randomly explosive from gases venting out of the ground!), and nobody'd want to live there.

[clare_dragonfly]

...that does seem to be what Conrad needs! And hey, no need to turn down help, even if it comes in the form of a jerk named Piotr. (Isn't that Taro's name? or is it Petyr or something like that?)

The first one is also fun, though my first thought was the bunny island in Japan and this was not nearly as adorable :-P

[aldersprig]

Japan has a bunny island as well as a kitty island? Japan is the best!!

Taro is Petyr. The similarity was intentional. If I’d written more… That might have become an issue.

[clare_dragonfly]

Japan is amazing! I need to go to bunny island someday.

[aldersprig]

I want to go to kitty island some day!