October Fan-Art #2 – A short story by ijed
I already thought no more submissions would come but Warp Spasm mastermind ijed submitted a short story:
Nail that fucker down!
He fired until empty, dropped the gun with precision. Just a knight, lower class, nothing special. Infected, the rage and hate of the place. He wasn’t always like this. Leaning his head on the wall he tried to think back, the harsh edges of the stone a cold counterpoint to the warm images he was trying to summon.
Had her name been Marie?
Had she been beautiful? Was that a trick of rememberance or a trick of this whole pitiful existance of violence he was trapped within.
Were the children part of that same phantasm. Stupid questions. Without worth. Only continued existance mattered now.
As if in response to his thoughts a shout came from the end of the hall. Another knight.
Would they never learn? Looked like a berserker as well. Machinelike, he dropped to one knee and took its head off. The body kept coming in mid swing, the bloody sword dropping in the last split second from the mailed fingers.
With an anguished roar he shoulder barged the charging corpse and took away the midsection in another blast.
Ears ringing, he fell to the floor, the shredded remains falling aside. He threw the shotgun aside and sobbed.
Inside, a part of him sneered. He wasn’t crying for higher ideals or his supposed lost humanity. He was crying for lost dreams. Seeing life on this side of the lens had long stripped away those sentiments, or so he’d thought.
Some time passed.
He stood up, recovered the shotgun. Needed to eat, losing strength. Looked at the knights destroyed corspe. No way. The portal ahead had endless promise.
What it was promising he didn’t want to think.
24.10.2009 10:06
Oh, poor Quakeguy. :(
I am glad that Quake does NOT have a deeper story. The protagonist having feelings or even relationships does not fit into my world.
Please don’t get me wrong though! This is so nicely written and does fit into the Quake atmosphere very well (in a “story -> game” way, not “game -> story” (no, I have no idea how to explain what I mean)).
I pictured him at the “jump against the light”-secret room on e1m5 with the first knight coming upstairs from the left and the other from the stairs on the right. Also http://yonaz.deviantart.com/art/quakeworld-3338875
24.10.2009 13:57
http://www.gamerswithjobs.com/node/47543
An interesting article about storylines in games.
Working on a couple of projects now where background there’s lots of, but continual story I’m toning down / removing.
The way we play games means it’s always when there’s time, we get back to the pc / console to frag stuff for a while, meaning the experience story wise is disjointed.
I like story heavy games, RPG’s for example, but they take over your time because to have fun you need to keep the narrative in mind.
So the constant: guy with guns in a demon filled dungeon – works perfectly.
25.10.2009 02:05
I really liked your entry ijed. Here’s one.
The Netherworld
No one’s scraped the blood off the walls here for at least a hundred years.
The only sound is my breathing.
Once every few hours a drip of water falls, somewhere off in the vast darkness.
These halls of dull metal must go on forever. Thousands of miles in every direction.
And the walls are all inscribed with bizarre characters – not hieroglyphics, not words – some script halfway between.
I’ve been unable to discover any meaning in them. But my shotgun is the most advanced thing here.
Meaning something carved out all those characters by hand, or by -
Miles and miles, on the floor, walls, ceilings, into seeming infinity.
Some inconcievable mad god.
I’ve met enough disciples – things without eyes that crawl out of the darkness.
Sometimes I see other humans, or – former humans. From different time periods.
One time I saw a guy with the same kind of gear as me. Real messed up. No eyes, just bloody holes. Screaming.
Most of the humans I see – maybe one or two a month, but then what’s Time here? – wear metallic armour.
Like they’re from centuries ago, earth time. The middle ages. Makes me think they knew something we don’t.
But the vast majority of the moving flesh I’ve seen here is not human, nothing like it.
I can’t remember when I got here, and I don’t think I’ll ever leave. Nothing can save me.
25.10.2009 09:53
Ijed – I liked your story
26.10.2009 04:19
Thanks, glad it sparked some interest.
Like the netherworld description, reminds me of At the Mountains of Madness – whole style is pretty Lovecraftian.
26.10.2009 17:41
Both are great!
I pictured ijed story as a slow motion scene, with only the sound of his hearth and tired breathing…
And Tronyn story could be used as a introduction of Quake RPG, narrative style like Max Payne uses.