Dundunduuuuun

Hopefully you're not sick of reading about Brogan bleeding, because I found one more.

Another clever title

Morgan's recent post inspired me to dig through my NaNo shorts for things that weren't too shitty to be posted. Also I guess this is the week to talk about Brogan's lady problems.

Steam bath

So I started this last November on a train. Almost two pages of no plot ahaha. Ha.
Here take it.
All credit for the brilliantly hysterical title goes to Mouse.

more nano shit

The oak tree grew in the heart of the American northwest. Clean air, ample rainfall, and consistent temperatures allowed it to grow and prosper. The natives round their branches to be thick and sturdy and ideal for creating any number of tools. It wasn't until the settlers came that the great monsters were chopped down in their entirety. Hundreds of years to grow, and all that remained were gnarled stumps as far as the eye could see. Firewood, cabins, chairs, tables-- no matter what the craft, the hard wood served well. The trees, forever stationary, made it around the world in pieces and the huge steamships transported them-- in planks and completed projects alike, from port to port.

Mr. Harper was not always a practical man. He had his wife to keep him in check for that, and thus, was able to drift with his dreams and float with his fantasies until she nudged him on the shoulder and tugged him back to earth. He loved her dearly for it. She was not with him when he wandered past the lumber yard. It was far from a typical desitation, mind, but then, very little of Mr. Harper's actions qualified as typical.

He stepped into the large stone building (he found it amusing that a building that was dedicated to lumber would be built from stone, but he had no one to voice this to, and therefore kept his chuckling quiet and close to his chest) and eyed the impressive equipment that wound through the entirety of it. Great conveyor belts moved whole trees to various saws that trimmed branches and sheared bark and sliced the green wood. The place smelled of ash and the sweat of its workers, and most overpowering of all, the earthy smell of the trees themselves. He watched burly men haul branches thicker than his waist. Children were employed to keep the floors clear of the smaller boughs, and they scurried fearlessly between the legs of the giants, and under the conveyor belts.

It wasn't until he had stood for fifteen minutes or so that someone spotted him. The word spread through the employees with startling speed after that, and he could tell because their already tremendous productivity seemed to double. He belatedly realized that it was not likely every day that someone stood in their doorway with a suit as nice as his.

A short, dumpy man inquired politely as to his reason for attending their workshop. Having no other answer, Mr. Harper pointed at a large section of untreated oak and stated that he wanted to purchase it. If his wife had been there, she would have said something like 'oh, he is just fascinated by machinery' and they would have left. Mr. Harper spent fifteen minutes haggling over price (the end result which definitely favored him) and had to have a carriage called to have the great chunk of oak delivered to his estate.

"What are you planning on doing with it?" Mrs. Harper asked as they stood in front of his strange purchase. Her tone was more curiosity that irritation. He stroked his mustache. He hadn't actually thought about what he would do with a three-hundred pound piece of oak. ED sat atop it, idly kicking her legs and humming to herself.

"I think it should be a door," she remarked, and when her father's gaze beckoned her to go on, she gathered her feet under her and put her hands on her small hips. "Well it looks like it used to be a huge tree, and everyone knows that huge trees are fairy portals. Another word for portal is door. Therefore, it should be a door."

"Is that so?" her father questioned, and she nodded sagely before jumping into his arms.

Most people would have laughed at the adorable statement and catalogued it as something to bring up in amusement over dinners years later. Mr. Harper was not most people.

Sixteen years later, ED stood with a blindfold over her eyes, her hair cut short into a men's fashion and her slim frame bound beneath her academic uniform. "Father, it's quite impractical to keep a blindfold on me while you present a gift. It makes it rather difficult to see," she stated, and received a chuckle in response.

"Well then, remove it," her father responded. When she did, an airship enveloped her vision. It was old and tired, but it made her gasp all the same. "Can't very well be a pilot without one of these, eh?" He accepted her hurried kiss on the cheek and followed after her up the ramp into the belly of the ship. His smile never paused as she ran her fingers over every inch, calling out ideas on how to improve, and what needed to be done. Her excitement made him giddy.

Abruptly, she went silent. The door to the bridge was locked. It was not this fact that bought her silence, but rather the door itself. The pale wood was intricately carved with a forest scene. The texture of the bark on the trees was carved with intricate detail. Individual leaves on the bushes were palpable. ED ran her fingers over the grains, experienced the scene with her fingertips and her eyes. The stream cutting through was lacquered more heavily than the rest, giving it a permanently wet appearance.

"It's your fairy portal," her father said as he pressed the brass key into her palm. She threw her arms around his neck and squeezed like she was five years old.

Three years later, as her smoldering wreckage of her ship tore in half and was swallowed by the depths of the sea, it was the engraved oak door that she and Percy clung to until their rescue.

---

OKAY SO THIS IS SO SHITTY I UNDERSTAND, I GET IT. Shhh. Shhh. But I could not stop snickering as I wrote it. I hope someone gets the joke. 

London-Hungry: Steampunk Tidbit

I - I wrote a thing, guys. It's weirdly written in terms of sentence structure and I don't know why but WHATEVER WHATEVER I'm just gonna post it. I also feel like the tense is fucked up but I'm too tired to fix it now. Any critique or advice in terms of grammar or character stuff is more than welcome. Like, yes please. Explanation in terms of character/plot at the end.

Steampunk snippets

I participated in MLS's midterm marathon at her school this year and had a great time doing it. Two of the stories that I wrote there were steampunk, and so close to NaNo, it really got my brain in that mindset. I am currently 10,498 words into my project, and every last word of it has been steampunk. HERE ARE A FEW SAMPLES. :3

The Irish Were Never Meant to Fly

Genre: Steampunk

A monologue

Pair

Genre: Steampunk
Prompt: Pair
Time: 80 min