Infinity Smashed: The King of Adventures
Dec. 29th, 2014 10:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lb_leeOkay, here's the other winner from the Patreon Bonus Poll! It was prompted by Megan, and sponsored by the Patreon crowd: Caelyn Sandel, Holly Bianchi, Patricia Gerrdes, AnonVW, Lydian Kenzall, and B. M. Prager
The King of Adventures
Word Count: 1600
Summary: Raige is having a little trouble adjusting to his situation. M.D. ‘helps.’
Notes: Still early in Book One, directly after That Time With the Bears.
The moment we were out of bear territory, up went the lean-to and down went me. And I stayed down, despite my usual propensity for super-light sleeping. Planetary destruction wouldn’t have roused me, and it was the best thing to happen to me all day.
When I finally woke up due to my bladder, I was still tired, but at least I felt like a sentient being again. Night had come on and so had a light drizzle, pattering against the tarp and trees. Everything was damp and cold and still—and thankfully dry, under my tarp. I mentally thanked Vandorsky’s zine collection.
Bobcat was curled up sleeping on my backpack. Next to him was the silver ball, which had apparently returned while I was out, and next to them both was another backpack, presumably Raige’s, which had not survived the fall nearly as well as mine. On top of it was the purple paperback with the robot on it, which was a little worse for the wear but still in one piece. Raige himself was nowhere to be seen.
Well, that was none of my concern. With a shiver, I tucked my hands into my armpits and went to find a tree to water.
I had finished and was readying myself for the return to my cozy sleeping bag when I heard a sound. I froze and for one delirious second, I thought that the bears had followed us. Then I realized it wasn’t wildlife at all.
It was Raige. And he was sobbing.
I zipped up my jeans and followed the sound, trying to make as much human-sounding noise as possible. He neither screamed in terror nor told me to go away, so I figured he knew I wasn’t wildlife either.
I found him in a small clearing, all folded up in a miserable ball of limbs and tears.
“Hey,” I said. “I take it the ball says we’re stuck here.”
He nodded but didn’t look up or stop crying.
“Bummer.”
Then I was stuck. This was the part where I was supposed to do something comforting. I knew that, but I didn’t know how. Not many people cried in front of me, so it wasn’t like I had much experience—like me, Vandorsky had long since lost the ability to cry.
If Raige was embarrassed about doing it in front of me, he was too upset to care.
I walked over to him and squatted down. Just because he didn’t care about the mud on his jeans didn’t mean I wanted to get colder.
“Uh, there there?” I said. “It’ll be okay?”
He seemed to make some cursory attempt to stop the waterworks, but failed. The sound made my chest hurt, and I didn’t know why. “For you, maybe,” he snuffled. “You seem to be handling this way better than me.”
Even after the rest, I was too tired to get annoyed. Needing an excuse to avoid looking at him, I picked at my scabbed hands. “Look, we’re both in one piece. We’ve got my stuff. You’ve got… your robot book?” He looked at me incredulously. “Hey, I was too busy learning about tarps and paracord to learn how to cheer people up.” There certainly hadn’t been a zine about it in Vandorsky’s collection. “Cut me some slack.”
The sounds he started making were even more alarming, till I realized he was trying to laugh and cry at the same time.
“There, see, I’m succeeding already. I’m a survivalist genius.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not, okay? This wasn’t how my Spring Break was supposed to go.”
“How was it supposed to go?” I asked. “Where were you going, anyway?”
“To visit my great-aunt.” He scrubbed at his eyes with his sleeve. “I do it every holiday.”
“The one in Anchorage with the bears?” He nodded. “What’s she like?”
“Uh, old. Plays bridge.” He sniffed, wiped his nose. “Owns like half a dozen ferrets…”
“Wow, such excitement. Thrills by the bushel.” I gave him a look. “Now, Raige, look me dead in the eye and answer me truthfully: were you really that enthused at the prospect of visiting your boring old great-aunt and her Alaskan ferrets?”
“Well…”
“Exactly. Think of it this way, milquetoast.” I didn’t like doing it, but he was clearly upset, so I finally wrapped an arm around his flannel-clad shoulders and waved an arm at the forest, the fog, the rain. “This here is an adventure. Like the one in your robot book.”
“That one’s kind of more of a romance—”
“But they had adventures, right? Everyone has adventures.” He made a noise I chose to interpret as assent. “Have you?”
“Well… no, I guess…”
I gave him a squeeze and a shake, then let go of him when he turned pink. “Tragedy. That’s tragedy, milquetoast. You’re lucky I came along. Because you know what I’m really, really good at, even more than tarps and paracord?” He shook his head. “Adventures, milquetoast. I am the king of adventures.”
He sniffed but looked at me hopefully. “Really?”
“Absolutely. Just ask Vandorsky— that’s my esteemed associate. She’ll tell you, when it comes to adventures, I’m tops. Because adventures, buddy boy, are the best thing in the world—the whole universe, maybe. Everyone else out there, they’re just picking out their boring little lives, letting everyone tell them what to do, but when you’re adventuring, you get to say what to do, not them.”
Raige was starting to smile. “Yeah? How many have you been on?”
“Just one: my life,” I said. “And that makes it the best life anyone could have. Trust me, you might be scared now, but when we get you home, you’ll have a great story to tell everybody, and you’ll be glad you went.”
“You think so?”
“Know so. It’ll be great. You’ll love it. And you’ve got me on your side. You know what that means?”
“What?”
“It means you’ll be fine. Guaranteed. Because I’m the king of adventures, which means I’m also the king of surviving. And since you’re with me, that extends to you. You’re golden, milquetoast.”
“You promise, huh?”
I gave him my most winning smile. “Milquetoast, would I lie to you?”
He seemed to buy it; he wasn’t crying anymore, anyway, and he wiped his eyes.
“That’s the spirit.” Even in my gloves, my hands were freezing. I tucked them into my armpits.
“You cold?”
“I’m good.”
He sat up straight, began taking off the green flannel he wore. I waved him off.
“Keep it, keep it.”
“Look, I’m not cold. You are.” All he had on under it was that ridiculous Latin T-shirt, but he didn’t seem to mind. He held the flannel out to me. “I’m pretty sure my ancestors had antifreeze in their blood. It’s okay.”
I gave him a suspicious look, then snatched the flannel from him, felt it over, sniffed it. Soft, frayed, too short for him but too long for me. It smelled like rain and boy, and I wasn’t sure I wanted it. I didn’t like taking gifts.
“Um. You’ve got…” he gestured at his wrists.
“What? Oh.” My bandages were starting to hang out the ends of my sleeves again. To be fair, they’d been through a lot. I shoved the ends back in; I’d redo them when I got back and he wasn’t watching me.
“What happened to you, anyway?”
“Oh, you know, adventure. Don’t worry about it.” I pulled the flannel on. It was warm from his body. “Thanks for the shirt, milquetoast. I’ll be sure to treasure it always. You going to come back with me, or do you need to cry some more?”
“I… I think I’ll stay out here some more. Thanks, M.D. I… I really appreciate you giving me a pep talk and everything.” He was turning red.
“No problem.” I stood up and began to head out. “I’ll redo the bedroll, give you room. Oh, and don’t touch me; I have a habit of assaulting people in my sleep.”
“That’s… good to know?”
I left him to it.
Redoing the bedroll, and by proxy the lean-to, took a little careful finagling. After all, my emergency pack was intended to cover me, not me plus boy and cat. Fortunately, my tarp was forgiving, and I managed to work something out. I unzipped the sleeping bag and folded it out to give Raige room, and finally gave him the padding too. I was used to sleeping on hard surfaces; I’d cope better.
The bustling around woke Bobcat briefly. Is everything all right?
“Fine. Go back to sleep; that’s what I’m doing.”
Where’s Raige?
“Enh.” I shrugged. “Hasn’t been eaten by wildlife yet, so I guess he’s fine. Now, what are the actual odds of us getting out of here?”
Bobcat was silent, and I didn’t need to be a telepath to see the gears turning.
“Don’t feed me the bushwah you gave Raige. I haven’t even checked my food stash yet and I already know we’re in trouble.”
After a long pause, Bobcat said carefully, that would depend on you, actually.
“Me? How so?”
Whether your affinity for electricity can be used to repair my transporter. If you can’t, well. It might be a bit of a proposition.
“Hm.” I thought that over. “All right then. We’ll get started on that tomorrow.”
You seem to be taking this all rather well. Bobcat sounded suspicious.
“Lucky for you I’m the king of adventure, huh?”
I kept my boots on and curled up in a ball on top of the sleeping bag—I knew the ground would suck the heat out of me faster than the air. Still a bit chill, but at least with Raige’s tent of a flannel, I could cope. Within short time, I drifted off back to sleep, despite Bobcat giving me a watchful look from my backpack.
The King of Adventures
Word Count: 1600
Summary: Raige is having a little trouble adjusting to his situation. M.D. ‘helps.’
Notes: Still early in Book One, directly after That Time With the Bears.
The moment we were out of bear territory, up went the lean-to and down went me. And I stayed down, despite my usual propensity for super-light sleeping. Planetary destruction wouldn’t have roused me, and it was the best thing to happen to me all day.
When I finally woke up due to my bladder, I was still tired, but at least I felt like a sentient being again. Night had come on and so had a light drizzle, pattering against the tarp and trees. Everything was damp and cold and still—and thankfully dry, under my tarp. I mentally thanked Vandorsky’s zine collection.
Bobcat was curled up sleeping on my backpack. Next to him was the silver ball, which had apparently returned while I was out, and next to them both was another backpack, presumably Raige’s, which had not survived the fall nearly as well as mine. On top of it was the purple paperback with the robot on it, which was a little worse for the wear but still in one piece. Raige himself was nowhere to be seen.
Well, that was none of my concern. With a shiver, I tucked my hands into my armpits and went to find a tree to water.
I had finished and was readying myself for the return to my cozy sleeping bag when I heard a sound. I froze and for one delirious second, I thought that the bears had followed us. Then I realized it wasn’t wildlife at all.
It was Raige. And he was sobbing.
I zipped up my jeans and followed the sound, trying to make as much human-sounding noise as possible. He neither screamed in terror nor told me to go away, so I figured he knew I wasn’t wildlife either.
I found him in a small clearing, all folded up in a miserable ball of limbs and tears.
“Hey,” I said. “I take it the ball says we’re stuck here.”
He nodded but didn’t look up or stop crying.
“Bummer.”
Then I was stuck. This was the part where I was supposed to do something comforting. I knew that, but I didn’t know how. Not many people cried in front of me, so it wasn’t like I had much experience—like me, Vandorsky had long since lost the ability to cry.
If Raige was embarrassed about doing it in front of me, he was too upset to care.
I walked over to him and squatted down. Just because he didn’t care about the mud on his jeans didn’t mean I wanted to get colder.
“Uh, there there?” I said. “It’ll be okay?”
He seemed to make some cursory attempt to stop the waterworks, but failed. The sound made my chest hurt, and I didn’t know why. “For you, maybe,” he snuffled. “You seem to be handling this way better than me.”
Even after the rest, I was too tired to get annoyed. Needing an excuse to avoid looking at him, I picked at my scabbed hands. “Look, we’re both in one piece. We’ve got my stuff. You’ve got… your robot book?” He looked at me incredulously. “Hey, I was too busy learning about tarps and paracord to learn how to cheer people up.” There certainly hadn’t been a zine about it in Vandorsky’s collection. “Cut me some slack.”
The sounds he started making were even more alarming, till I realized he was trying to laugh and cry at the same time.
“There, see, I’m succeeding already. I’m a survivalist genius.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not, okay? This wasn’t how my Spring Break was supposed to go.”
“How was it supposed to go?” I asked. “Where were you going, anyway?”
“To visit my great-aunt.” He scrubbed at his eyes with his sleeve. “I do it every holiday.”
“The one in Anchorage with the bears?” He nodded. “What’s she like?”
“Uh, old. Plays bridge.” He sniffed, wiped his nose. “Owns like half a dozen ferrets…”
“Wow, such excitement. Thrills by the bushel.” I gave him a look. “Now, Raige, look me dead in the eye and answer me truthfully: were you really that enthused at the prospect of visiting your boring old great-aunt and her Alaskan ferrets?”
“Well…”
“Exactly. Think of it this way, milquetoast.” I didn’t like doing it, but he was clearly upset, so I finally wrapped an arm around his flannel-clad shoulders and waved an arm at the forest, the fog, the rain. “This here is an adventure. Like the one in your robot book.”
“That one’s kind of more of a romance—”
“But they had adventures, right? Everyone has adventures.” He made a noise I chose to interpret as assent. “Have you?”
“Well… no, I guess…”
I gave him a squeeze and a shake, then let go of him when he turned pink. “Tragedy. That’s tragedy, milquetoast. You’re lucky I came along. Because you know what I’m really, really good at, even more than tarps and paracord?” He shook his head. “Adventures, milquetoast. I am the king of adventures.”
He sniffed but looked at me hopefully. “Really?”
“Absolutely. Just ask Vandorsky— that’s my esteemed associate. She’ll tell you, when it comes to adventures, I’m tops. Because adventures, buddy boy, are the best thing in the world—the whole universe, maybe. Everyone else out there, they’re just picking out their boring little lives, letting everyone tell them what to do, but when you’re adventuring, you get to say what to do, not them.”
Raige was starting to smile. “Yeah? How many have you been on?”
“Just one: my life,” I said. “And that makes it the best life anyone could have. Trust me, you might be scared now, but when we get you home, you’ll have a great story to tell everybody, and you’ll be glad you went.”
“You think so?”
“Know so. It’ll be great. You’ll love it. And you’ve got me on your side. You know what that means?”
“What?”
“It means you’ll be fine. Guaranteed. Because I’m the king of adventures, which means I’m also the king of surviving. And since you’re with me, that extends to you. You’re golden, milquetoast.”
“You promise, huh?”
I gave him my most winning smile. “Milquetoast, would I lie to you?”
He seemed to buy it; he wasn’t crying anymore, anyway, and he wiped his eyes.
“That’s the spirit.” Even in my gloves, my hands were freezing. I tucked them into my armpits.
“You cold?”
“I’m good.”
He sat up straight, began taking off the green flannel he wore. I waved him off.
“Keep it, keep it.”
“Look, I’m not cold. You are.” All he had on under it was that ridiculous Latin T-shirt, but he didn’t seem to mind. He held the flannel out to me. “I’m pretty sure my ancestors had antifreeze in their blood. It’s okay.”
I gave him a suspicious look, then snatched the flannel from him, felt it over, sniffed it. Soft, frayed, too short for him but too long for me. It smelled like rain and boy, and I wasn’t sure I wanted it. I didn’t like taking gifts.
“Um. You’ve got…” he gestured at his wrists.
“What? Oh.” My bandages were starting to hang out the ends of my sleeves again. To be fair, they’d been through a lot. I shoved the ends back in; I’d redo them when I got back and he wasn’t watching me.
“What happened to you, anyway?”
“Oh, you know, adventure. Don’t worry about it.” I pulled the flannel on. It was warm from his body. “Thanks for the shirt, milquetoast. I’ll be sure to treasure it always. You going to come back with me, or do you need to cry some more?”
“I… I think I’ll stay out here some more. Thanks, M.D. I… I really appreciate you giving me a pep talk and everything.” He was turning red.
“No problem.” I stood up and began to head out. “I’ll redo the bedroll, give you room. Oh, and don’t touch me; I have a habit of assaulting people in my sleep.”
“That’s… good to know?”
I left him to it.
Redoing the bedroll, and by proxy the lean-to, took a little careful finagling. After all, my emergency pack was intended to cover me, not me plus boy and cat. Fortunately, my tarp was forgiving, and I managed to work something out. I unzipped the sleeping bag and folded it out to give Raige room, and finally gave him the padding too. I was used to sleeping on hard surfaces; I’d cope better.
The bustling around woke Bobcat briefly. Is everything all right?
“Fine. Go back to sleep; that’s what I’m doing.”
Where’s Raige?
“Enh.” I shrugged. “Hasn’t been eaten by wildlife yet, so I guess he’s fine. Now, what are the actual odds of us getting out of here?”
Bobcat was silent, and I didn’t need to be a telepath to see the gears turning.
“Don’t feed me the bushwah you gave Raige. I haven’t even checked my food stash yet and I already know we’re in trouble.”
After a long pause, Bobcat said carefully, that would depend on you, actually.
“Me? How so?”
Whether your affinity for electricity can be used to repair my transporter. If you can’t, well. It might be a bit of a proposition.
“Hm.” I thought that over. “All right then. We’ll get started on that tomorrow.”
You seem to be taking this all rather well. Bobcat sounded suspicious.
“Lucky for you I’m the king of adventure, huh?”
I kept my boots on and curled up in a ball on top of the sleeping bag—I knew the ground would suck the heat out of me faster than the air. Still a bit chill, but at least with Raige’s tent of a flannel, I could cope. Within short time, I drifted off back to sleep, despite Bobcat giving me a watchful look from my backpack.
no subject
Date: 2014-12-31 05:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-12-31 09:42 pm (UTC)Raige is freaking out, sure, but that's because he's a normal boy who way preferred READING about fantasy adventures than having one. You might notice he's doing way better in Book Three than M.D. is.
Part of why freak out characters tend to be so tedious is that in a lot of stories, the plot can't happen until they get over the freak out. So the story slows to a crawl while they cope, and the reader gets sick of it. I'm trying to avoid that, without having the, "Welp, guess I'm in Narnia now, off we go!" thing M.D. does.
--Rogan
no subject
Date: 2015-01-03 05:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2015-01-04 02:12 am (UTC)