Sorciere Posted September 22, 2003 Report Posted September 22, 2003 Ellie ran from the entrance of the cave to the small raised area overlooking her town. The big rumble of thunder she had heard from deep inside the darkness had startled her, it was supposed to be sunny all day! As she stood on the grass with her skirt pulled close up to her waist, huddling her harvest of small mushrooms, she stared with a puzzled expression. The sun was shining down on her just as it had been earlier that afternoon when she ran from her home and up to the cave, despite her mother's warning to stay close by. They were supposed to go to her aunt's at the beach that afternoon but papa had decided to stay one more day to finish his work, she hated papa's work, but mommy said it's what put food in her tummy, so when he asked if she minded waiting just one more sleep, she had not objected at all. Ellie loved to pick mushrooms, in the small deep cave there was one particular spot where they grew in abundance. It was a tricky little walk to reach them, you had to balance very well, her friend Tabitha could never come here, she couldn't even balance on the school beam. Ellie however, was quite the little gymnast and could quite easily manage to creep her way through the cave in the darkness. It was here that she first heard the big rumble of thunder. A little paniced, she tried to rush out of the cave too fast and slipped, spilling her precious cargo over the dark floor. Ellie thought for a second. If her momma was to find out she was here, which she surely would if she arrived home all wet and dirty, she would be smart to at least take the mushrooms. At least something for dinner would abate her momma's scorn. Ellie knelt down on the floor and began groping in the dark for the fungii, slowly recollecting all she had scattered. After filling up her her skirt to bursting, she made her way to the entrance. The clear bemusement on Ellie's face was evident. She was sure she had heard the thunder, even a five year old knows what the bad clouds sound like! Sure enough there was a big huge cloud in the afternoon sky, but it was the only one. Around it the sky was gloriously blue and although there seemed to be quite a harsh wind all of a sudden, there was no rain. Looking down towards her small town of Bentley Rapids, Ellie could see something was very wrong. There were little clouds of smoke coming from a lot of places. Old Mrs Harley's place always smoked like that, but that was on account of the crows in her chimney, this was every house! In fact, the houses didn't even look right. Ellie's eyes quickly shot across to where her own little yellow house stood. Her papa had pointed it out to her from this very spot just last spring. He told how grateful she should be that they had a house like that and a view like this and that people in other places had no shoes on their feet and no food in their tummies. Ellie was grateful, very grateful. She was even safe walking the half mile to the cave to get her mushrooms, in other towns papa said they wouldn't even let their children play outside after dark! Her house wasn't there. Well, it was, maybe. Something was there, but it too was smoking and it certainly wasn't yellow. A rush of fear ran through Ellie like a jolt of electricity and she dropped all her mushrooms on the floor about her, not even noticing she had done so. Running down the hill towards her home, tears of panic welled up in her eyes and she repeatedly stumbled on the rocks and twigs laid in her path. She had to venture through town to reach her house, but as it came closer, Ellie could see now why everything looked so wrong from the hill. It was all gone. The houses were all black and burning, some were gone completely, only a mass of bricks remained. Cars all looked the same, a dull black colour, only their shapes told them apart and they were all up the wrong way. The worst thing Ellie only noticed by chance. She was walking carefully along the pavement avoiding all the blackened marks and heaps of burnt rubbish when she looked down and saw a small Snoopy dog, the pullalong kind. It was eerie in it's appearance because it was still coloured, the only thing in her view that was. She followed her line of vision from it's red bobbing tail, still wagging in the desolate wind, to the cord used to pull it along. At the end of the cord was a little hand and attached to the hand was another pile of black rubbish. Only then did Ellie realise she had not been dodging rubbish, but bodies, people, everywhere. The scream didn't last for long, the faint for only a few minutes. When she opened her eyes again, everything was still the same as her nightmare. Quietly Ellie took the Snoopy dog from the little child who did not resist and she pulled it along behind her, strolling up the street together as if in some surreal TV show. Ellie wanted her momma. She wanted her papa too, but she couldn't remember where she lived anymore. Right at the sweetshop, left at the barbershop, straight past the bank and then another right at the garage. She remembered her directions perfectly, but nothing was here anymore. Ellie couldn't tell the sweetshop from the grocery store or Mrs Harley's house, they were all just masses of black. Another rumbling noise vibrated through Ellie's body, this one came from the ground though, not the sky. Just as she was about to run, she saw a big truck heading down the street towards her. Two men in spacemen suits got out and started towards where she was stood. She wanted to run, but her head hurt and there was really nowhere to run to, so when they approached her and asked her her name, she smiled sweetly and answered Ellie, then fainted again. She woke up in the back of the truck, alone. She turned her head to see the two men in the front talking to each other through their masks. One was a big man, the other a lot smaller. The big man seemed angry, he was yelling about mistakes and accidents and a 30 mile Contamy Nation zone, how Mr Roosevelt was messing with things he didn't understand. Ellie thought it was wrong to talk about Mr President that way, but declined to speak up. The little man was disagreeing with him, saying how New Clear was the way to go, that one mistake was not enough to stop progress. Ellie didn't know what New Clear was, but it sounded very important! As they drove from the town, Ellie went back to sleep, her head hurt so much now and her arms were itchy, so itchy............ "Ellie? Honey?" you need to wake up little lady, daddy wants to talk to you. Ellie opened her eyes and saw her momma stood over her like a blue angel. Ellie jumped up from the couch where she had been napping and took a good long look around the room, then at her momma. "Are you ok honey?" her mother asked. Ellie ran to the window and looked outside, everything was just as it should be. "I'm fine!" grinned Ellie and ran to where her papa was stood out on the porch. "Baby, I really need to finish some work here before we go to aunt louise's beach house, I know you really wanted to go today, but is it ok if we just stay one more sleep here?" "NO!" screamed Ellie. It hurt her so to shout this way to her papa, he was a lovely man. "We have to go today! We have to go now! I wanna go to aunt louise's!" Ellie put on the tantrum of her life. She went red, she screamed, the tears came all by themselves. "Please papa, let us go today, pleaseeeeeeeeee?" she looked up into his big, brown eyes, then turned to see her momma stood at the door staring at her in disbelief. "Well, ok then, we'll go today, if you feel that strongly about it Ellie. I really should get this work done though, I hope you realise the trouble you are going to cause me young lady!" Ellie nodded. As they climbed into the car and drove on the highway out of town, she thought to herself that her papa being mad with her for a few days would be worth it and as fifty five miles east of Bentley Rapids, the radio announced a huge nuclear explosion which stretched over a thirty mile radius and wiped out almost everything in it's path, she knew it was worth it. (Please excuse any typos, I have tried to proofread it, but I don't have a spellcheck on here yet and you know when you try to read something you just wrote, the errors hide in the story)
Jareena Faye Posted September 23, 2003 Report Posted September 23, 2003 Ahhh, I see the word play now! A very good idea. Great short story, girl! There were a few run-on sentences that you should learn to look out for, but all-in-all I think this story is so good it deserves to be longer. You should consider it!
Wyvern Posted September 25, 2003 Report Posted September 25, 2003 I liked this story as well, Sorciere, and thought that the concept was well-thought out and nicely executed. I particularly liked when Ellie mistook the dark cloud and the rumble for a storm only to find out that it was in fact her town being destroyed... The word-choice is very good at times as well, as we really get a feel that it's Ellie's story throughout... As Jareena Faye said, one thing you might try to improve to make the story even better is to correct certain grammatical/spelling faults, particularly run-on sentences. For example, in this sentence: "They were supposed to go to her aunt's at the beach that afternoon but papa had decided to stay one more day to finish his work, she hated papa's work, but mommy said it's what put food in her tummy, so when he asked if she minded waiting just one more sleep, she had not objected at all." Numerous thoughts are expressed, and they should be divided into seperate sentences or seperated by means of semi-colons. Once again, very enjoyable story overall.
WrenWind Posted September 25, 2003 Report Posted September 25, 2003 Great images and a wonderful story. *Hugs*
Appy Posted September 26, 2003 Report Posted September 26, 2003 *hugs* (everything's been said, i'll just smile)
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