This blog has been dead. I'd like to revive it, though I've been so pre-occupied that I haven't really had time to think much about stories. Well, ones written on my own that is, as there've been plenty of collaborative efforts between me and friends of mine for our own amusement. My short attention span tends to cause ideas to never really develop into anything when I do have them.
At present, I have some character ideas that could possibly lead to some short fiction. Very short, flash fiction/micro fiction/drabble type stuff. Just something, some new writing that I can post on here so I feel a little accomplished. I know I can't commit to anything larger than flash fiction right now, so hopefully in keeping a realistic perspective by aiming for shorter pieces I can actually generate some ideas. When I'll come up with something, I don't know, but I'm going to aim for the near future. I'm studying a few things on my own right now (meaning non-college studies) that just might spark a few ideas.
Fingers crossed I can get my arse going again with this.
Saturday, July 28, 2012
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Story: "Damage Control."
This is the first short story I managed to complete after a very long bout of writer's block (other writings were merely snippets or scenes). It's a total rewrite and upgrade of a story I wrote around three years ago, inspired by some behind-the-scenes stories of the making of the first "Evil Dead" movie. The ending is a little weak, I do realize, as endings are not one of my strong points (something I'm trying to fix). Regardless of this fact, I had a hell of a lot of fun writing this one, and like it enough to share it with people, imperfections and all.
Cheers!
Jesse
The tension had been building up over the last three days as the film crew had discovered for the third morning in a row that despite all security measures taken, vandals had broken into the old factory where they were filming and had trashed their set. The attack on them and their film wasn’t a surprise; when the locals had learned of filmmaker Aaron Ramsey’s plans to make a movie inspired by the horrendous murders committed by Jeremiah Bayliss back in the 1990s, filming in the same factory where the victims had been tortured, killed, and dismembered, they hadn’t exactly been too happy about it. Still, the crew had been allowed to go forward with making the film, the town committee hoping that it would help to boost their tourism industry. The town was in a lot of debt and needed to take any chance that would potentially bring them money. As Aaron had promised to give a good percentage of any money made off of it to the town as a means of thanking them for allowing him to film there, it seemed a good a chance for the committee to take as any, even if it did piss people off. Now, barely two weeks after they’d first arrived to set up, Aaron and his film crew had run into a major setback. Props, set pieces, and expensive equipment had all been badly damaged, leaving them with very little to work with and barely any extra funds to buy replacements. Until the various financers could be contacted in hopes of getting more money to replace what had been broken, the sets would have to be rebuilt by hand, and they’d have to make do with the few pieces of equipment they had left.
Worse than the loss of time and finances was the damaged morale of the film crew, the understandably soured moods leading to arguments breaking out over the smallest of things. Aaron was feeling the stress more so than anyone else, as he’d spent the last five years working hard to find backing for the film as well as a cast and crew who knew what they were doing and were willing to take a chance with helping him to make his first feature film, all while working for next to nothing. His film had been sabotaged, and now he faced the possibility of the cast and crew getting fed up and disbanding. He hadn’t slept in almost 72 hours, the anxiety levels so high that he could feel every muscle in his body tightening in reaction to the stress. Knowing that he couldn’t risk any more losses, he had come up with the idea to stay overnight, suspecting that the vandals would more than likely return, planning on scaring them off. After explaining this idea to his co-producer Ryan, an argument had erupted between the two, slowing down work progress as it caught the attention of the others as it grew worse and worse.
“Dude, I’m just saying that it’s a really bad idea. What if instead of getting scared off, they beat the shit out of you or even kill you? Did you even think of that? They hate us, especially you,” Ryan snapped, mere inches away from Aaron, hovering over him in an intimidating fashion. “Don’t be an idiot, Aaron.”
“The only idiotic move would be for me to not stay! Three times, man, three fucking times they’ve come here and trashed everything. You know as well as I do that they’re going to keep at it until they drive us out of town, and I’m not gonna let that happen! I stay, catch them in the act, and either scare them off or at least see their faces so I can report them to the police. If they get violent, I’ll just fight back. Enough shit around here makes a good weapon.”
“Pfft, hate to break it to you, but you ain’t exactly intimidating, and anyone in this room could kick your ass in two seconds flat.”
“Fuck you!” Aaron gave him a hard shove, Ryan stumbling back and giving him a surprised look for a moment before charging forward and knocking Aaron to the ground, kneeling down and seizing one of Aaron’s arms, pulling it upwards and twisting it slightly to keep him down. Aaron let out a yelp of pain as his arm was twisted, the struggling ceasing as he gave in to defeat.
“See? This is what I mean. Tell me again how you’re gonna defend yourself if they come after you.”
“Not my fault you’re a giant,” Aaron growled at him. “Now get off of me!” Ryan let go of his arm and stood, stepping back as Aaron got up to his feet. “I’m staying. That’s it. If something bad happens, I’ll handle it. Now get back to work!”
Scoffing, Ryan shot him a glare before going back to trying to fix the broken audio recorder he’d been working on prior to the fight. Those who had been watching quickly resumed whatever they’d been working on, leaving Aaron to head outside to start calling each of the film’s backers to let them know what was going on and make a plea for another donation to replace the broken equipment.
By nightfall, a decent amount of progress had been made in regards to rebuilding the set, though the damaged equipment had proved to be unfixable. It was close to midnight when Aaron told them to wrap it up and go back to the hotel. As everyone filtered out of the building, Ryan hung back, walking over to the table Aaron was sitting on. “Nothing I say is gonna change your mind, is it?”
Letting out a bitter chuckle, Aaron removed the pack of cigarettes from his back pocket, lighting one up and taking a drag. “Took you that long to figure it out, huh?”
“Don’t be such a dick, I’m just trying to keep you alive.”
“Don’t be so overdramatic. I’ll be fine. If they’re gonna pull something as cowardly as sneaking in and breaking shit, I highly doubt I’m gonna have a problem with them coming after me. Besides, if I get them thinking that I’m doing this every night, it might get them to give up.”
Ryan fell silent, letting out a sigh and shaking his head. “Alright. Fine. You win. See you in the morning.” He headed for the door, slamming it shut behind him, the sound echoing throughout the building.
Finally alone, Aaron hopped off of the table and grabbed up one of the flashlights over by the door, making sure it worked before moving his hand towards the light switch. Taking a look over the area one last time, he dropped his cigarette to the stone floor and stepped on it, then flipped all of the switches off. A sliver of moonlight cast into one of the windows provided just a tiny bit of illumination, casting shadows in a few spots that made the place look just a bit more eerie. Turning the flashlight on, he moved forward into the dark, heading towards the back of the factory where they had found the last two ways in the vandals had used. He could hardly wait for them to show up, praying that they’d try starting shit with him just so he had an excuse to attack them.
A sudden stench assaulted Aaron’s nostrils as he passed by the doorway of what had served as the factory’s break room as well as Bayliss’s execution chamber for his victims. The smell was a mixture of vomit, feces, urine and blood so strong that it seemed fresh. Gagging, he covered his mouth and flashed the light towards the doorway, cautiously approaching it, looking inside. The room was completely empty save for the bolted-down chair in the center of the room, a replica of the one Bayliss had used that they’d put in a week before. While most of the props in various areas of the building had been trashed, this room hadn’t been touched, Aaron assumed from the fear stemming from the things that had gone on in the room all those years ago. The smell remained strong for a few more seconds as he stepped inside, and then suddenly disappeared. “What the hell?” he muttered, trying to figure out the cause of the bizarre olfactory hallucination. Stress, it had to be stress. It’d happened before during times of extreme upset, smells of a source that couldn’t possibly be there just suddenly appearing. It was disturbing, but a trick of the mind was all that it was.
Leaning against the doorframe of the room, he took a moment to calm himself down before continuing towards the back of the factory. Though he was a life-long horror fan and difficult to frighten, even he found the building creepy. As most murder sites were, the factory was rumored to be haunted. However, there hadn’t been any sort of activity during the time they’d been in the place, not even on the nights where they’d worked until sunrise. Even with the lack of any signs of being haunted, he couldn’t deny that there was an unsettling feel to the place that suggested that the rumors just might’ve been true.
Finally reaching the back of the factory, he took a seat behind an old, rusty filing cabinet that kept him out of immediate view of anyone trying to get in. It was the perfect position; no matter where the vandals chose to enter, he’d be completely out of sight. Resting against the cabinet, he reached down to flick away a small spider that had started crawling up his pant leg. In spite of the anticipation of the arrival of the saboteurs, he could feel the exhaustion finally starting to kick in. He tried to fight it, but it wasn’t long before his tiredness finally won out as he drifted off to sleep.
It wasn’t the sound of voices or banging that woke Aaron up just moments later, but a coldness in the air more intense than the factory usually was at night. Shivering, he opened his eyes, his heart almost stopping as he looked upon the tall, dark, mist-like form that hovered above him. It lingered for only a moment before vanishing. He couldn’t even move for the longest time, simply staring at the spot where the form had been. That couldn’t have been real, there was no way.
Finally able to get himself up to his feet, he peeked around the corner of the filing cabinet towards the boarded up doors in the back, seeing no signs of disturbance, or other strange forms hovering about. “Get a grip,” he mumbled to himself, fumbling for his pack of cigarettes, hands shaky from the fear that still held a tight grip on him. He paused as up from the front of the factory came the echo of a man laughing. Looking up, his fear vanished and his mind became once again focused on the reason why he’d stayed overnight in the first place. He made his way out of his hiding spot, starting to hurry as quietly as he could towards the front, keeping the flashlight off so as to not give away his presence just yet.
Unfortunately, the combination of a lack of paying attention, a small, old metal pipe that had rolled away from a nearby stack, and the near total darkness wound up cutting his trip to the front short. His foot came down on the pipe, and he slipped and fell backwards, hitting the floor hard, the wind knocked out of him. Unable to move much as he tried to catch his breath, he didn’t notice right away the loud creaking from far up above him, the continued laughter up near the front keeping most of his attention. Just as he started to sit up, there was a loud snapping sound, and a loose metal beam came crashing down from the ceiling, landing across his midsection.
The pain was so intense that he couldn’t even scream, the taste of blood quickly filling his mouth. Even though he already knew that his efforts would be futile, he tried to push the beam off of him, but it proved to be too heavy. “Help me,” he finally gasped, praying that the vandals were still there. “Help me!”
His cries were met only by silence, the realization hitting him that he was totally alone and had hours to go before anyone would find him, let alone get him to a hospital. Unless something miraculous happened, he’d be dead long before dawn. A tiny light several feet to the side gave away the position of his cell phone, which he couldn’t even remember dropping. He felt the beam pressing even harder against him as he coughed, splattering blood across the dusty stone floor. His eyes stung with tears, his body trembling. If this was what the protesting townspeople had been wishing for, then they could thank God for their answered prayer. Bitterness rose up within him; if it hadn’t been for those jackasses sabotaging the set, he’d be alive and well.
There was a shuffling sound behind him, informing him that he wasn’t alone after all, giving him a sliver of hope. He tried turning his head to see who was there, but whoever it was remained just out of sight. “Please help me,” he whimpered in desperation, the unseen person’s breathing becoming more audible, though he or she didn’t speak. “I’ll shut down the film, I’ll do whatever you want, just please help me,” he begged. “I’m sorry!” There was still no answer, only breathing, which led to Aaron breaking down and sobbing hysterically, only calming some as his body started to shut down and he grew weaker.
Just before he died, he whispered one last, “I’m sorry,” and from behind him, the figure finally spoke.
“Too late to be sorry.”
Cheers!
Jesse
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Damage Control”
by Jesse Rooney
The tension had been building up over the last three days as the film crew had discovered for the third morning in a row that despite all security measures taken, vandals had broken into the old factory where they were filming and had trashed their set. The attack on them and their film wasn’t a surprise; when the locals had learned of filmmaker Aaron Ramsey’s plans to make a movie inspired by the horrendous murders committed by Jeremiah Bayliss back in the 1990s, filming in the same factory where the victims had been tortured, killed, and dismembered, they hadn’t exactly been too happy about it. Still, the crew had been allowed to go forward with making the film, the town committee hoping that it would help to boost their tourism industry. The town was in a lot of debt and needed to take any chance that would potentially bring them money. As Aaron had promised to give a good percentage of any money made off of it to the town as a means of thanking them for allowing him to film there, it seemed a good a chance for the committee to take as any, even if it did piss people off. Now, barely two weeks after they’d first arrived to set up, Aaron and his film crew had run into a major setback. Props, set pieces, and expensive equipment had all been badly damaged, leaving them with very little to work with and barely any extra funds to buy replacements. Until the various financers could be contacted in hopes of getting more money to replace what had been broken, the sets would have to be rebuilt by hand, and they’d have to make do with the few pieces of equipment they had left.
Worse than the loss of time and finances was the damaged morale of the film crew, the understandably soured moods leading to arguments breaking out over the smallest of things. Aaron was feeling the stress more so than anyone else, as he’d spent the last five years working hard to find backing for the film as well as a cast and crew who knew what they were doing and were willing to take a chance with helping him to make his first feature film, all while working for next to nothing. His film had been sabotaged, and now he faced the possibility of the cast and crew getting fed up and disbanding. He hadn’t slept in almost 72 hours, the anxiety levels so high that he could feel every muscle in his body tightening in reaction to the stress. Knowing that he couldn’t risk any more losses, he had come up with the idea to stay overnight, suspecting that the vandals would more than likely return, planning on scaring them off. After explaining this idea to his co-producer Ryan, an argument had erupted between the two, slowing down work progress as it caught the attention of the others as it grew worse and worse.
“Dude, I’m just saying that it’s a really bad idea. What if instead of getting scared off, they beat the shit out of you or even kill you? Did you even think of that? They hate us, especially you,” Ryan snapped, mere inches away from Aaron, hovering over him in an intimidating fashion. “Don’t be an idiot, Aaron.”
“The only idiotic move would be for me to not stay! Three times, man, three fucking times they’ve come here and trashed everything. You know as well as I do that they’re going to keep at it until they drive us out of town, and I’m not gonna let that happen! I stay, catch them in the act, and either scare them off or at least see their faces so I can report them to the police. If they get violent, I’ll just fight back. Enough shit around here makes a good weapon.”
“Pfft, hate to break it to you, but you ain’t exactly intimidating, and anyone in this room could kick your ass in two seconds flat.”
“Fuck you!” Aaron gave him a hard shove, Ryan stumbling back and giving him a surprised look for a moment before charging forward and knocking Aaron to the ground, kneeling down and seizing one of Aaron’s arms, pulling it upwards and twisting it slightly to keep him down. Aaron let out a yelp of pain as his arm was twisted, the struggling ceasing as he gave in to defeat.
“See? This is what I mean. Tell me again how you’re gonna defend yourself if they come after you.”
“Not my fault you’re a giant,” Aaron growled at him. “Now get off of me!” Ryan let go of his arm and stood, stepping back as Aaron got up to his feet. “I’m staying. That’s it. If something bad happens, I’ll handle it. Now get back to work!”
Scoffing, Ryan shot him a glare before going back to trying to fix the broken audio recorder he’d been working on prior to the fight. Those who had been watching quickly resumed whatever they’d been working on, leaving Aaron to head outside to start calling each of the film’s backers to let them know what was going on and make a plea for another donation to replace the broken equipment.
By nightfall, a decent amount of progress had been made in regards to rebuilding the set, though the damaged equipment had proved to be unfixable. It was close to midnight when Aaron told them to wrap it up and go back to the hotel. As everyone filtered out of the building, Ryan hung back, walking over to the table Aaron was sitting on. “Nothing I say is gonna change your mind, is it?”
Letting out a bitter chuckle, Aaron removed the pack of cigarettes from his back pocket, lighting one up and taking a drag. “Took you that long to figure it out, huh?”
“Don’t be such a dick, I’m just trying to keep you alive.”
“Don’t be so overdramatic. I’ll be fine. If they’re gonna pull something as cowardly as sneaking in and breaking shit, I highly doubt I’m gonna have a problem with them coming after me. Besides, if I get them thinking that I’m doing this every night, it might get them to give up.”
Ryan fell silent, letting out a sigh and shaking his head. “Alright. Fine. You win. See you in the morning.” He headed for the door, slamming it shut behind him, the sound echoing throughout the building.
Finally alone, Aaron hopped off of the table and grabbed up one of the flashlights over by the door, making sure it worked before moving his hand towards the light switch. Taking a look over the area one last time, he dropped his cigarette to the stone floor and stepped on it, then flipped all of the switches off. A sliver of moonlight cast into one of the windows provided just a tiny bit of illumination, casting shadows in a few spots that made the place look just a bit more eerie. Turning the flashlight on, he moved forward into the dark, heading towards the back of the factory where they had found the last two ways in the vandals had used. He could hardly wait for them to show up, praying that they’d try starting shit with him just so he had an excuse to attack them.
A sudden stench assaulted Aaron’s nostrils as he passed by the doorway of what had served as the factory’s break room as well as Bayliss’s execution chamber for his victims. The smell was a mixture of vomit, feces, urine and blood so strong that it seemed fresh. Gagging, he covered his mouth and flashed the light towards the doorway, cautiously approaching it, looking inside. The room was completely empty save for the bolted-down chair in the center of the room, a replica of the one Bayliss had used that they’d put in a week before. While most of the props in various areas of the building had been trashed, this room hadn’t been touched, Aaron assumed from the fear stemming from the things that had gone on in the room all those years ago. The smell remained strong for a few more seconds as he stepped inside, and then suddenly disappeared. “What the hell?” he muttered, trying to figure out the cause of the bizarre olfactory hallucination. Stress, it had to be stress. It’d happened before during times of extreme upset, smells of a source that couldn’t possibly be there just suddenly appearing. It was disturbing, but a trick of the mind was all that it was.
Leaning against the doorframe of the room, he took a moment to calm himself down before continuing towards the back of the factory. Though he was a life-long horror fan and difficult to frighten, even he found the building creepy. As most murder sites were, the factory was rumored to be haunted. However, there hadn’t been any sort of activity during the time they’d been in the place, not even on the nights where they’d worked until sunrise. Even with the lack of any signs of being haunted, he couldn’t deny that there was an unsettling feel to the place that suggested that the rumors just might’ve been true.
Finally reaching the back of the factory, he took a seat behind an old, rusty filing cabinet that kept him out of immediate view of anyone trying to get in. It was the perfect position; no matter where the vandals chose to enter, he’d be completely out of sight. Resting against the cabinet, he reached down to flick away a small spider that had started crawling up his pant leg. In spite of the anticipation of the arrival of the saboteurs, he could feel the exhaustion finally starting to kick in. He tried to fight it, but it wasn’t long before his tiredness finally won out as he drifted off to sleep.
It wasn’t the sound of voices or banging that woke Aaron up just moments later, but a coldness in the air more intense than the factory usually was at night. Shivering, he opened his eyes, his heart almost stopping as he looked upon the tall, dark, mist-like form that hovered above him. It lingered for only a moment before vanishing. He couldn’t even move for the longest time, simply staring at the spot where the form had been. That couldn’t have been real, there was no way.
Finally able to get himself up to his feet, he peeked around the corner of the filing cabinet towards the boarded up doors in the back, seeing no signs of disturbance, or other strange forms hovering about. “Get a grip,” he mumbled to himself, fumbling for his pack of cigarettes, hands shaky from the fear that still held a tight grip on him. He paused as up from the front of the factory came the echo of a man laughing. Looking up, his fear vanished and his mind became once again focused on the reason why he’d stayed overnight in the first place. He made his way out of his hiding spot, starting to hurry as quietly as he could towards the front, keeping the flashlight off so as to not give away his presence just yet.
Unfortunately, the combination of a lack of paying attention, a small, old metal pipe that had rolled away from a nearby stack, and the near total darkness wound up cutting his trip to the front short. His foot came down on the pipe, and he slipped and fell backwards, hitting the floor hard, the wind knocked out of him. Unable to move much as he tried to catch his breath, he didn’t notice right away the loud creaking from far up above him, the continued laughter up near the front keeping most of his attention. Just as he started to sit up, there was a loud snapping sound, and a loose metal beam came crashing down from the ceiling, landing across his midsection.
The pain was so intense that he couldn’t even scream, the taste of blood quickly filling his mouth. Even though he already knew that his efforts would be futile, he tried to push the beam off of him, but it proved to be too heavy. “Help me,” he finally gasped, praying that the vandals were still there. “Help me!”
His cries were met only by silence, the realization hitting him that he was totally alone and had hours to go before anyone would find him, let alone get him to a hospital. Unless something miraculous happened, he’d be dead long before dawn. A tiny light several feet to the side gave away the position of his cell phone, which he couldn’t even remember dropping. He felt the beam pressing even harder against him as he coughed, splattering blood across the dusty stone floor. His eyes stung with tears, his body trembling. If this was what the protesting townspeople had been wishing for, then they could thank God for their answered prayer. Bitterness rose up within him; if it hadn’t been for those jackasses sabotaging the set, he’d be alive and well.
There was a shuffling sound behind him, informing him that he wasn’t alone after all, giving him a sliver of hope. He tried turning his head to see who was there, but whoever it was remained just out of sight. “Please help me,” he whimpered in desperation, the unseen person’s breathing becoming more audible, though he or she didn’t speak. “I’ll shut down the film, I’ll do whatever you want, just please help me,” he begged. “I’m sorry!” There was still no answer, only breathing, which led to Aaron breaking down and sobbing hysterically, only calming some as his body started to shut down and he grew weaker.
Just before he died, he whispered one last, “I’m sorry,” and from behind him, the figure finally spoke.
“Too late to be sorry.”
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