Prose offering of May 14th

[Ceraziefish]

Alright, welcome to the first prose thread! This is a story I wrote in December of last year. I've written more of it, but I think this part stands alone well.

What I'm looking to improve; mostly the language. This story was meant to be somewhat atmospheric, while also developing the character of the main character, and the character of the social problems that have struck the world. There isn't any dialogue in this story, which is somewhat intentional. Some of the additional parts I've written include dialogue, but I'm usually hideously bad at dialogue. So.

It's sort of set in a persisting universe I have, where I've written a few stories set in post-apocalyptic Pacific Northwest. I hope you enjoy it!

--

Most of the people in Portland had starved.

That was what it was like there when I left; things had gotten so bad that I couldn’t fathom staying there longer. And, truth be told, I wasn’t the first to leave. I didn’t leave until my entire apartment building was empty, except for me. In fact, I left on the exact day I went down the stairs (the elevators hadn’t worked for months beforehand) to pay my rent and found out that my landlord had expired that morning.

I walked into his office and saw him just lying there, head down on his desk. He was bundled up in his winter clothes; we all had been since the furnace broke down and no one came to fix it. I looked at him silently, then looked at the check in my hand. It was doubtful my bank still would’ve validated it, anyway. I walked over to him, checked his pulse and found out that he, like so many others, had died. Whether he died of the bad cough, or the cold, or from no food I couldn’t tell and didn’t care. I picked him up, his small asian frame moving easily under my muscles, and carried him outside to the little garden.

His wife had often tended this garden, in the years back; she had been one of the first to die, though, and the entire apartment building had gone to the funeral. It was a nice affair, on a cold winter’s day. A cold winter’s day like the day I buried my landlord.

It didn’t take very long. Everyone left in Portland by then was, if nothing else, handy at gravedigging. The shovel hadn’t even been put away since the man in apartment 34 died. I put up a wooden cross at his headstone, and wrote his name on it in sharpie, so you would know that this was Mr. Luke Takamoto’s grave, and not any of the other people we hadn’t been able to transport to the graveyard since it closed last year.

I guess the main reason I decided to leave was that there wasn’t any more room for bodies left in that garden. The apple tree would have a lot of fertilizer, I guess. More fertilizer than I had food. In spite of everything, the plants seemed fine. I had always liked that tree; in the fall I would always grab a few apples from it on my way to work. Of course I hadn’t bothered coming into work for a couple of months.

I returned to my apartment and finished my dinner of cold, canned beans. It was the last of the government issue I had stolen from the National Guard. Everything seemed pointing towards me to leave; someone had thrown rocks through my window and it was even colder in my room.

So I went into the next room and gathered up my supplies. I laid out my thick wool coat on my bed, and pulled snow pants up over my jeans. My backpack hadn’t been used for a couple of summers, but I was sure I could trek as easily with it now as I had then; after all, then it had been for fun, and now it was for my survival. I filled it with warm clothes and what food I could find. I packed my little camping stove; and my sleeping bag, which was rated to -10 degrees. And I’d need every bit of that. My water bottles I would have to fill along the way. I could carry four liters on me, but I didn’t have a source of water here. If I had gone to work in the last few months I could probably qualify for some aid from the government, but they didn’t help people who didn’t work.

I put on my coat and then swung on my backpack; after tying my boots, pulling on my hat and gloves, I was ready to go. I locked my door to give someone the satisfaction of picking it to get at my stuff and headed outside.

There wasn’t any snow, because it wasn’t nearly wet enough, but it was bitterly cold. I passed a few people huddled around fires on the way out of town, but didn’t stop to talk to them because of the looks they gave me; they all knew where I was going. I was going away, like maybe they had heard of their cousin going, or their friend, or their brother. Like so many people, I was giving up on the City-State of Portland, the last bastion of civilization on the West Coast.

I would miss these people, though. For most of my life they had been my citymates. I remembered back in the days of the parades, when we would all get together and celebrate our soldiers’ victories in far-off lands. I remembered the week of citywide grieving when Washington D.C. fell; I remembered the aggressive punk shows of my happy teenage years, when things were starting to get tough. I remembered when the punk shows were shut down, because they caused trouble and riots. What I most clearly remembered, though, was the day Mayor G. Grant came to power and called back Oregon’s National Guard. This was the day after the Governor was assassinated while speaking at my college graduation.

Times had been tough since we split off from the Union. But again, we weren’t the first to do it. The Federal Government never quite recovered from the Second Battle of Washington, and I think Vermont was the first to secede. After that it was a slow succession of states leaving. But we were proud Oregonians! We could survive without the authoritarian grip of the Feds. We could farm on our own, produce our own industry, our own electricity.

Everyone was idealistic when the city council voted unanimously to make G. Grant Mayor-for-Life. We were going to move on into the future, even as Seattle and San Francisco burned around us. Then the food stopped coming.

Washington D.C. was burned to the ground by enemy soldiers, and New York City was hit with nuclear weapons; the East Coast fell before our enemies did, but not much before. But the west coast had the honor of killing itself. Seattle abandoned when the mountains rebelled and the power stopped flowing from the dams; San Francisco was burned down in a violent revolution that set up the People’s Republic of California for a good six months, before that, too collapsed. Southern California was annexed by an increasingly violent Mexico; unfortunately, the Mexicans only took back what we took from them in the 19th century, so Oregon was left alone.

For years I watched my home state crumble, never doing anything about it. I kept going to my job at the Oregonian, but after we ran out of paper to keep printing it I hardly saw the point. That was a few months ago.

I remembered all of these things as I walked through the empty, late afternoon streets of Portland. I said goodbye to each building, each old haunt, knowing I would probably never see them again.

When I left the city I didn’t know where I was going; I was just leaving the city. I ended up on the outskirts of the city, near an onramp to Interstate 84. There had been a really violent riot here a year ago. One of the workers’ unions had demanded fair wages and an end to government corruption, and the National Guard had been ordered to disperse the demonstration. By that time, “disperse” meant “kill.” But the some of the National Guard sided with the workers, and smuggled them weapons, and turned on their squadmates when the attack started. The Battle of I-84 lasted for three days, and the eventual outcome was that anyone who really cared was dead. Gunshots flared throughout the city, but by the time it was over all the National Guard officers and union organizers were dead. Once the few guys left shooting at each other realized that, they threw down their guns and walked off, disgusted.

I walked up the onramp, which in years past I had driven up when I went to go visit my parents in Pendleton. There were still bullet casings and other battlefield detritus I didn’t want to think about lying around.

When I emerged onto the crumbling interstate I was impressed by the amount of broken down cars. I hadn’t been to this part of town in awhile, and they were everywhere. Once the gas stopped coming in, people just drove their cars as long as they could and abandoned them wherever they could.

As long as I walked along the freeway I was accompanied by dead cars.

[PMA]

I'll comment more on structure and such later (just about out the door)... but I just wanted something cleared up.

Is there a drought going on or something? Because at one point you said Oregon was proud to be able to sustain its own crops... yet then a little later "the food stopped coming in," implying they were getting it from some outside source (unless you meant that the farmers outside of the "city-state" were no longer a viable workforce).

Just needed some clarification on that point, since the apple tree getting "lots of fertilizer" wouldn't amount to much if it didn't get any rain. And frankly, a drought factors into the progression of the collapse quite a bit.

[Chris]

I really like the structure of the story, it gives off a 1984 type feel. A miserable future where people are essencially controlled by the events surrouding them, and are left to somehow fend on there own. I could see what your going for and it's awesome. The invention of a history being told from the eyes of your character, really gets my interest. I hope to read the rest of your tale soon. The only thing I would reccomend would be a to say what the character feels about the situation rather than explaining what was happening. Anyway, great work :crube:

[Ceraziefish]

I'll comment more on structure and such later (just about out the door)... but I just wanted something cleared up.

Is there a drought going on or something? Because at one point you said Oregon was proud to be able to sustain its own crops... yet then a little later "the food stopped coming in," implying they were getting it from some outside source (unless you meant that the farmers outside of the "city-state" were no longer a viable workforce).

Just needed some clarification on that point, since the apple tree getting "lots of fertilizer" wouldn't amount to much if it didn't get any rain. And frankly, a drought factors into the progression of the collapse quite a bit.

I meant that the farmers had stopped sending in the food they were making (because they weren't making as much). A drought could be at work, too. I could add that in. What I was trying to go for was that the character didn't really know what was up, why the food stopped coming in.

I really like the structure of the story, it gives off a 1984 type feel. A miserable future where people are essencially controlled by the events surrouding them, and are left to somehow fend on there own. I could see what your going for and it's awesome. The invention of a history being told from the eyes of your character, really gets my interest. I hope to read the rest of your tale soon. The only thing I would reccomend would be a to say what the character feels about the situation rather than explaining what was happening. Anyway, great work

Thanks a bunch! In my opinion, the story takes a huge downturn in quality after this first part, but I suppose that's what editing is for.

[Chris]

Yeah, always constantly edit, with editing it will probably be fine, A good idea, as strange as it is, is when you stop working on it for the day, when you wake up the next day, read over parts you were unsure about, and the mistakes you had made really come to light.

[Tanni Foemangler]

cool man :thumbsup:

excuse the lack of criticism, i'm not much of a litterateur

[Ceraziefish]

cool man :thumbsup:

excuse the lack of criticism, i'm not much of a litterateur

It's all good. Positive reviews help too :hardgay:

[amy]

I really enjoyed reading this. I am no Helpful Reviewer either but I love how you slowly reveal the situation and how some of the sentences really hit you, "Of course I hadn't bothered coming into work for a couple of months." The concept is really fascinationg too. You never think of the Battle of I-84 and people just driving their cars along the highway but if we had battles now, that would be it.

[Ceraziefish]

I really enjoyed reading this. I am no Helpful Reviewer either but I love how you slowly reveal the situation and how some of the sentences really hit you, "Of course I hadn't bothered coming into work for a couple of months." The concept is really fascinationg too. You never think of the Battle of I-84 and people just driving their cars along the highway but if we had battles now, that would be it.

Thanks to you to!

This is definitely one of my favorite pieces of writing that I've done. Much better than the rest of it, I think. Haha.

[ROCKSTEADY]

I dug it alot, I also did a post apoctalyptic piece for my entry :hardagy: . I really love how vague it is.

[PMA]

One thing I thought I'd point out:

You manage to pull off first person past perfect tense pretty damned well. Though you DO slip into past progressive quite a bit, which can be kind of awkward... in THIS story's case it doesn't detract too much. That's quite a feat in a short story that hasn't been edited by anyone other than yourself (I'm ASSUMING no one but yourself read through it until us). Props, yo.

Also, I LOLed at the same part the second time reading through this. Vermont being the first to secede. Hahaha

[ROCKSTEADY]

Call me crazy, but I really like tense shifts.

[PMA]

Tense shifts are fine stylistically if done right... but most of the time they just come off as awkward. For this story, he seems to be going for a unified tense through the story, and it's very sporadically and for no reason that the tense shifts. Thus, I would ASSUME it's just a mistake on his part and not a stylistic choice. I could be wrong, but that's my impression.

[Ceraziefish]

One thing I thought I'd point out:

You manage to pull off first person past perfect tense pretty damned well. Though you DO slip into past progressive quite a bit, which can be kind of awkward... in THIS story's case it doesn't detract too much. That's quite a feat in a short story that hasn't been edited by anyone other than yourself (I'm ASSUMING no one but yourself read through it until us). Props, yo.

Also, I LOLed at the same part the second time reading through this. Vermont being the first to secede. Hahaha

...Dude I don't even know what the difference between perfect past tense and past progressive is. All the English grammar I know, I learned from studying other languages (which isn't a bad way to learn it, it's just that my knowledge is incomplete).

I sort of have an idea of the difference now that I'm thinking of it but I'm having trouble putting it into words. Also I'm hungry as hell, so I'm gonna get some food, and then read Rocksteady's story. (Rocks: Post Apocalyptic is like my favorite genre. I have a shitton of PA stuff on my computer).

But, yeah, a few people have read this story, but no one's edited it. Thanks.

[PMA]

Well in theory, there are 4 MAIN types of past tense. While its not a HUGE deal to switch between tenses (as long as you stay within time-tense parameters), it generally makes something much easier to read if you just stick with one tense for each "action." Let's put it this way:

I jerked off on your bedsheet

I had jerked off on your bedsheet

I was jerking off on your bedsheet

I had been jerking off on your bedsheet

While each is A past tense, they all have a very distinct meaning in terms of WHERE in the past you are. I'm not critiquing the story, I'm just saying if you want a really smooth read that won't get attacked by grammar-Nazis like me, you should try and maintain tenses for INDIVIDUAL ACTIONS (not necessarily the whole story). I'll go through your story again and highlight areas that have that issue, I just noticed it a few times and the english minor in me got stopped up a few times.

[Ceraziefish]

Hm. I'm not really sure I understand, grammatically, the difference, but I've always written by what sounds right anyway, and I can tell the difference that way.

I'd take some English classes but reading is mad boring.

[PMA]

Ehh... don't worry about it. Not that big of a deal. Hahaha

[Ceraziefish]

If it's not too much trouble, I'd like it if you could highlight somewhere in my story where I do that.

Nice example in your original post, BTW.

[Bundydoc]

I guess the main reason I decided to leave was that there wasn’t any more room for bodies left in that garden.

I could carry four liters on me, but I didn’t have a source of water here.

The only thing I think needs some more explanation is that you mention above that the main reason the character is leaving is that there isn't any more room in the garden - which paints a great image. However, you say later (also above) that he didn't have a water source. I would think that if there wasn't anymore water, that would be the biggest motivator to leave. Did he just run out, had it been out a few days and he can't survive anymore?

Just some thoughts. Overall I love the imagery and the setting that the story takes place. It definately caught and held my attention which is important for the opening to any story. I would love to read more. As for the tense - that is something I struggle with too. I HATE IT :)