Write club!
My mate Andy came round for a bit of Write Club, we had to pick an image from the first five pages of Flickr's images of the week, and a random word or phrase from Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase & Fable - and write a story based on what was uncovered. Andy picked for me this image located here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/grooveraider/3438207596/And the words, "King Charles X of France."
One thousand five hundred word limit, I managed one thousand four hundred and ninety nine, unconciously and most excellently.
And this is the mad stuff what I came up with, apologies for the formatting being a bit screwed via message postage -
By Mario’s Early Light
It intimidated; this den of wires, scarlet buttons and glowing neon screens. It frightened Charles, made his skin crawl, the room so resolutely unfamiliar from his usual environs. His son lazed in an antique chair of Ince & Mayhew, a small glass of port at his feet. Beside him, one of his friends, flicked through a game manual. Before them a sturdy monitor shone a friendly chunky font.
Charles squinted at the glare, read the words haltingly, “Super Mario Bros.”
“That’s ‘brothers’ father,” replied his son, who insisted on the name Chaz, though his father still insisted on the correct royal moniker. Chaz flushed in mild embarrassment.
“Another new game?” Charles asked tiredly, leaning in the door frame.
“From Japan.”
“Of course.” Charles groaned inwardly, ever since his son’s trip to the land of Nippon and his attachment to Akihito’s house, he had become obsessed with the flood of electronic miracles flowing from its shores. They weren’t just toys either – Charles noted to his amazement that the same circuitry that lay in the belly of the little plastic beast before him guided their missiles, mapped the routes of their airships, swung invisible eyes that scanned the oceans and skies. France’s little empire benefitted from a favourable trade, she was the major European power now and had been since the sixties, since the fragmentation of Austria and Hungary. It struck him as a little ironic that the keenest espouser of the Japanese way was not the pleasant, dapper little ambassador lazing in the Rhineland Summer Palace but his own son, supposedly the embodiment of France.
He found it a little scary.
But these toys were the future, and he could not afford the Luddite attitudes of the Americas and Britain, for the Russians shared his son’s hunger.
Charles decided not to dwell on such things on the weekend, leave that to Lucien. “Are you not going to introduce me to your new friend?” he asked politely, turning a benevolent smile upon the spotted youth with the chestnut hair. He liked the way the little English boy had risen, bowed and stammered his way through a polite greeting. His own son had long since cut Charles adrift, preferring to share his words with the glowing screen.
The boy sprung up again. “Prince Paul, your majesty,” he said.
“I know, I know,” said Charles, smiling deprecatingly, waving a hand. “I saw you last year at the London Opera. Tell me, how fares you father?”
“He is stronger, with God’s blessing. Happily the dose he received was slight, he was very lucky.”
“The hand of God, not luck, saved your father. A divine wind. Had the breeze held…” and Charles gave a little shudder.
“Then my father would have been as dead as the poor souls of Spitalfields. Rest assured the anarchists will not evade us for long.” And here Paul paused and blushed a little before continuing, “We thank you for the kindness of the French people. Our people convey the liveliest appreciation of the fund. The hospital for nerve damage will be the finest in the world.”
“I am sure of it. You hear that, son? They tried to kill his father. It is well he is safe here while they hunt the animals down.”
“I heard it father, it was in the news.” And Chaz rolled his eyes, and Charles found a new urge to strike the boy. He suppressed it, not in front of the Englishman. Still it was lucky that the boy piped up again.
“I like Mr Lucien very much.”
“As do I,” said Charles.
“I do hope he is earnest. About the alliance, I mean.”
Charles nodded in a fatherly way. “Would you care for a stroll around the grounds?”
Paul looked guiltily at the computer. Chaz was still trying to decipher the Engrish of the little comic that came with the game. It pictured a cheery moustachioed plumber on the cover. The Italian empire controlled the Suez and thence the trade route to the Indian Ocean and beyond, currently championed as Japan’s most favoured of allies. Charles couldn’t think of any conceivable reason otherwise why a fat, rotund, Italian plumber would be a flagship character for their immense gaming corporation.
“That’s quite alright,” said Charles. “Perhaps later? I shall take a nap on the terrace,” and he left the room.
“The AV Fanicom Advantage,” announced Chaz proudly, patting the chunky joysticks with affection. “The Joy-Bone is merde compared to this…”
“I’ve never played before,” admitted Paul. “Father won’t allow them in the palace.”
“You’ll be here all summer; you can try to beat my high scores. Here, watch,” and Chaz began to play. The little Italian wobbled his way jauntily over green hills, bouncing up into the air and smacking blocks with the top of his head, and squashing prowling mushrooms underneath his feet. “This is one of the better ones,” said Chaz, with the modest and knowledgeable air of a connoisseur. On and on the plucky fellow ambled, along pipes and in the clouds, across chasms and over floating platforms. Paul admitted himself fascinated. It was like nothing he had ever seen before. He hungered for a go.
And then Mario reached the end of the level, a little flag pole with the proud rising sun of Nippon sadly sprawled at its foot, and the flag of Russia flying arrogantly above. Chaz grinned with delight and raced for it, but before he got within reach the screen flashed with lightning and with an evil synthesised chuckle a giant Nutcracker Prince descended from the skies, rockets blazing from his Cossack boots and evil iron teeth gleaming. The cruel and sneering face of Empress Anastasia rippled in the sky, projected on the side of an Alexander Air-Fortress. She laughed and derided Italy’s nascent nuclear power, and dangled the French love interest - Princess Peach, wearing the Bourbon whites and bound by a whip from the cupola.
It was all a little on the nose, thought Paul. And then the screen flashed with lightning again, and later he would dimly remember the panic and the spasms as he fell to the floor writhing – face contorted.
The palace doctor felt the boy’s pulse, Charles stood anxiously by the bedside. “He’ll be alright,” he announced, “An epileptic fit. Unusual, there is no family history. It must have been a remarkably strong trigger.”
“What do I tell his father?” asked Charles in a dull, heavy voice.
“You tell his mother the truth, sire,” said Lucien, tall and gangly and his delicate glasses perched upon the tip of his nose. “She can tell him, from what I hear he genuinely is recuperating well, thankfully it is not merely a story. We need a strong ally in King William.”
“Was this an intentional attack? Anarchists?”
“I think not. A mere design flaw. I have heard of such things. All the same, it won’t win many friends for Nippon among the roast beefs.”
“My son…” began Charles.
Lucien gave a dry little cough and examined his fingernails. “Yes, that is somewhat of more concern, your majesty. He didn’t even notice the fit, from what I hear from the butler, he continued play – oblivious to his friend’s fit. I have directed Rimbaud’s men to take away the machines, the games, and inspect the code.”
“The code?”
Lucien gave a sympathetic sigh, “I find it a little hard to understand as well, sire. I spoke to Rimbaud yesterday; he uncovered the possibility of subliminal messages being implanted into certain games – very subtle ones, certainly subtler than the requisite and rather crude propaganda. I had meant to notify your majesty immediately, but the crisis in Gibraltar distracted me.”
Charles stiffened with anger a moment at the news of such an omission, but then the flood of indignation ebbed. The bomb in Gibraltar, crippling a British and French frigate and sinking an American merchant, had created certain pressing diplomatic problems. Lucien could be forgiven. The people who were evidently brainwashing his son – and he had little doubt as to who… they would be not so lightly spared. “You are forgiven, chancellor. I should have gotten rid of the devices long ago. I have spoiled and ruined this child. Thankfully I still have an uncorrupted nephew.”
“He drinks absinthe.”
“Only in moderation.”
Lucien grunted. “Well, I recall you yourself had a fondness once for the Green Fairy. Very well, your majesty, the nephew.”
“And instruct Rimbaud to copy the code for the English, they deserve a look as well. It will do well for the bonds of our two countries, and ill for Japan. Throw the new trade proposal into the pot. As for Nippon, by God – if they have done something to the boy…”
A year and nine months later operating from British colonial India, France wiped out the Nippon sixth fleet in Hawaii, a declaration of war landing on the Nippon embassy’s desk an hour before hostilities were opened. War had begun.
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