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August/Sept SHORT STORY COMP - "I'll Never For Get Whatisname"

Started by Bad City Blue, 16 August, 2017, 05:25:16 PM

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Bad City Blue

GREETINGS, festering boils on Tharg's backside.

After a little break to see if Summer would arrive (fat chance), it's time for another Short Story Competition.

The rules are 500 words or less on the topic wot will be given to you below. The one voted the best will get a scrummy 2000AD graphic novel, coutesy of those decidedly non boil like galactic megabeings at Rebellion.

So here's the topic...

I'll Never Forget Whatisname - just scribble down a story, poem or whatever about a minor character in the prog. It could be a cit who appeared in a single episode of Dredd or good old Bad City Blue, who many have tried to forget but I won't let 'em.

Maybe it's a story that you love but ebveryone else hates (further adventures of The Space Girls, perhaps).

Dig deep into those memory banks,and lets see what crawls out (then kill it with fire)

Basically, stay away from any of the big lads, try to be creative and above all fun.

Cheers and beers

BCB
Writer of SENTINEL, the best little indie out there

Heath C Ackley

Gawd what a challenge! Do we get extra points for using the most obscure character to have his/her/it's face illustrated in Twoothy?!
"Give a man a mask and he will give you the truth."

The Legendary Shark

#2
Quote from: Heath C Ackley on 17 August, 2017, 04:02:19 PM
Gawd what a challenge! Do we get extra points for using the most obscure character to have his/her/it's face illustrated in Twoothy?!

If so, it's time to start trawling through all those old readers' drawings in the first one hundred progs' Nerve Centres... :D
[move]~~~^~~~~~~~[/move]




Bolt-01

Kid Knee- The morning after.

The first thing that I notice, even before the smell, is the pain. It is always there and nothing shifts it. Even the blinding headache from the hangover I'm waking up to is just an extra notch in symphony of agony I live with.

But the smell is pretty bad so I decide to open my eyes and find out where on the station I am.

The glorious blue sky above me can only mean one thing- I'm not actually on the station any more. Which means I must've blacked out- which means- I don't know where I am.

Last I remember is Butch telling me he wanted me to hand over my blaster- collateral on my tab... and that was about half nine Doghouse time so assuming this is the following day I must be on Earth? But the smell? What is that?

I'm on a bench, looks to be about mid-morning and... Sunday, it's Sunday. I've still got my ID, so it's not the worst situation I've been in but I've not got my comm... what did I do with that?

I need a drink. Take the edge off this pain. And what the hell is that smell?

I don't recognise anything around me, so did I come here on my own? How? Was I with Maginty? I remember talking to him at one point- he was mooching drinks off some newbies...

Okay, I'm getting nowhere here. I need a drink and I think I might be about to be sick- this smell is making me feel even worse. For me being sick is a bit of a big deal- my plumbing is all messed up, comes from having my head on my right leg.

When I stand up the full horror of my headache sets in- I'm staggering up the path to the mall and why am I wet..? Oh, no- I've pissed myself. Which means I've got last nights beer piss dribbling down my leg towards my head. That's something norms don't have to deal with- sneckers. And that'll be the smell. Ah sneck...

Nothing I can do about it now- need to get back to the Doghouse, find a comm and get a drink- really don't care which comes first now.

The headache is really bad this morning- Dr Bob told me it was going to be getting worse, when she wasn't trying to lecture me about the drink, but she's got no idea how bad it really is. After all no-one else has got arthritis in their skull...

The mall is shut- Sunday- but I thought these places were all seven days a week opening- what time 'is' it?

Okay- I'm going back to my bench and get my head up for a bit- when this place opens I'll be able to get back, but I just wish I could remember where I was...

Bolt-01

Timothy

Thought for the Day with Bishop Desmond Snodgrass


You know, although Grud is all around us every day, too often he is not where he should be in our lives. The name of Grud seems to be in our every curse and oath, but we are all called to serve him with our hearts, our minds and above all our creds. It saddens me that while the mouths of the foulest citizens are full of Grud's name, his church is often empty and unable to fund the humblest of research trips for its senior clergy.

It was with this in mind that some months ago I approached one of our judicial representatives with a simple suggestion of a modest tax on those who take Grud's name in vain. I had expected more empathy and less flippancy from a senior Psi Judge, but her response - "Grud on a greenie" - set me thinking. Although she was dismissive I saw that this was no Cassandra, no prophet of doom, but rather a sign from Grud himself. Surely the people of this forsaken city were crying out for something with which to wipe up their greenies, and who better than the church to aid them in their need.

So I am pleased to announce an exciting new range of holy handkerchiefs which will be on sale in the church gift shop before, after, during or even instead of any of our services. These are quality mock-silk sheets tastefully emblazoned with the face of Grud and the words "bless you" in a variety of colours. They really are something special and each one has been personally folded by one of Grud's children so you can be sure of the church's wholehearted approval of every sneeze.

Of course the modern church is nothing if not inclusive, so for those who can't afford such luxuries we are also offering a range of tissues. Ideal for those on welfare who nonetheless want to help Grud's kingdom. They are available in man-size 4 ply, or Snork-size 8 ply for the grander conk. Because we can all play our part in Grud's plan, and with your help each atishoo in the city can trumpet his glory.

There were some naysayers in the focus group who felt that these products might be put to a more earthly purpose, and more than one of my brothers-in-Grud has felt uncomfortable about these holy products being used to mop up naughty spendings. Yet does Grud not bless the work of human hands? And is the coming of Grud not devoutly to be wished? With a holy product such as this sordid guilt can be a thing of the past.

So please, do your part to support Grud's work in this city, and treat yourself to a selection of handkerchiefs and tissues today. Just think, every tickle nose could be a cred closer to our fundraising goal and a step closer to my tour of the mega-cities of the world.

May Grud bless you, and all of your discharges.

Brian Corcoran

#5
The cry from a waking Sand-screech marked the first rays of the rising sun breaking the jagged horizon. It was colder here than homeworld, but the mork generated enough body heat through his saddle to keep the edge off as it thundered along the desert floor. He was thinking about his mate as his fur stirred pleasantly in the wind, but he was aroused from his reverie by the familiar frosty aches of age in the joints on his bare arms.

His blaster bounced in its holster on his hip. It felt good. A fine weight to it, even the slight gravity difference here did little more than make the gun feel more powerful, more 'definite'. A good weapon. Passed on to him by his brood-father, and his father before him.

Now he had taken the gun and his loyal boys to this new world. It had seemed a good place to keep a low profile for a while, far enough off the main track to not attract too much attention, and with plenty of rich pickings to be had. He liked it here. The atmosphere wasn't too different from home, smelled a bit strange, that's all. The light though, the light was different, more...blue. Played havoc with distance vision. It had meant a small change in tactics. Now they hit hard, hit fast, ambushed their targets where possible, and got out long before reinforcements could arrive.  Seemed to be working ok so far.  He and the boys had a lot of valuables stored all over, ready for transport off-planet.

Only downside was the food. The meat was good alright, there was plenty of it, and easy to catch too. Just maybe too easy. He and his boys liked a long hunt, to work up an appetite. These beasts are too easy to catch, no fight in them. There's no satisfaction in it, he thought, but he reckoned it was a small price to pay for such a succesful venture.

These last few days though, he'd come to realise the time was coming when they'd have to move on. Soon the authorities would seek outside help, someone tougher than these local farmers-turned-deputies.  Someone who knew how to shoot, and who wasn't dropping their droppings at the first sight of him and his boys coming at them, guns blazing. He hadn't gotten this far in life by not knowing when to move on from a good thing.

Just these two more jobs then, and he would put it to the boys that it was time to find a new place to hunt.

The day was brightening quickly as the Esmeralda supply caravan slowly came into view from the canyon below. As he and his boys crested the ridge on their morks, and began their charge down the steep hill towards the wagons, Bubo ran his tongue over the points of his fangs. He was hungry. He'd have to remember to keep one alive for afterwards.

"Ride, boys! ZAP THE SAPS!"

THE END.


I hope people remember Bubo, a brilliant character from one of my absolute favourite Strontium Dog stories. Hopefully he has a child somewhere who might carry on his work zappin' the saps.

NapalmKev

All of This.


A Visitor! In this most blighted of places, come sit, rest here awhile. You are not put off by my appearance? Good, there is much I would speak of and it is rare that someone chances by. In fact you would be the first in what?... 10,000 years? Maybe more, it's hard to keep track... my last visitor was the most curious thing, pink and fluffy with a nose like an Anteater. It appeared right in front of me, I tried to say hello but it ran screaming into the forest... My Forest! All of it!...

Oh, you're still here? Forgive me, my mind wanders. I try to forget the pain but without distractions... well, you can imagine. So tell me, why are you here? You can't be hoping to confront Him, surely? It doesn't pay to get on his bad side as you can plainly see... When everyone else returned to Earth, I remained! Murderers, Rapists, Genocidal Dictators! Every dark and twisted individual that had ever lived... and yet I remain here! An eternity of pain and torment just for playing my part in his Grand Plan... someone had to betray him so that he could make the ultimate sacrifice! For the salvation of those who are ultimately beyond help and redemption... Mindless apes... CATTLE!...

My apologies, I did it again. No don't go, you must understand what you are dealing with if you traverse any further. Vengeance can last forever in these parts... and it can be a bitter and painful affair... as you can see. And besides, I don't want you traipsing through my forest... It's twisted beauty stretching far into the beyond. Elegant and brutal all at once! And it's all mine! All of this... For just thirty pieces of Silver!

"Where once you fought to stop the trap from closing...Now you lay the bait!"

sheridan

Quote from: NapalmKev on 02 September, 2017, 06:43:01 PM
All of This.
my last visitor was the most curious thing, pink and fluffy with a nose like an Anteater. It appeared right in front of me, I tried to say hello but it ran screaming into the forest... My Forest! All of it!...

It's twisted beauty stretching far into the beyond. Elegant and brutal all at once! And it's all mine! All of this... For just thirty pieces of Silver!

I must confess I'm confused by this one - did the Gronk ever meet Judas Iscariot?

NapalmKev

Quote from: sheridan on 02 September, 2017, 10:25:40 PM
Quote from: NapalmKev on 02 September, 2017, 06:43:01 PM
All of This.
my last visitor was the most curious thing, pink and fluffy with a nose like an Anteater. It appeared right in front of me, I tried to say hello but it ran screaming into the forest... My Forest! All of it!...

It's twisted beauty stretching far into the beyond. Elegant and brutal all at once! And it's all mine! All of this... For just thirty pieces of Silver!


I must confess I'm confused by this one - did the Gronk ever meet Judas Iscariot?


I made the mistake of creating a time-travelling/Dimension shifting Gronk in a previous story. I now feel compelled to shoehorn him in wherever possible.*

Cheers

*the keen eyed amongst you will notice that the Gronk was alone when he appeared in the forest. He was not accompanied by the four Tek-Judges that teleported with him in 'A Necessary Judgement'. Where are they? What happened to them? I'm not even sure myself at the moment - the joys of writing myself into a corner.


"Where once you fought to stop the trap from closing...Now you lay the bait!"

Heath C Ackley

Sooo...this is my entry for this month's comp. Just for a challenge, I won't state from which strip this story originated. I wonder how long it will take the thrillpowered custodians and meisters on this forum to scour Twoothy history to find it!

THE SORROW IN THE STARS

He could hear them. They knew he could hear them. Barron had hard-wired Marko's audio sensors so that the pilot would always hear what they were doing. The intimate, organic sounds of their coupling shamed him. He was their unwilling voyeur. Beneath the metal and circuits, his heart and mind were still active, still raw.

'It's just a matter of patience.'Cora had once said as they waited for the intrusion-link to produce the combination to a max vault. 'All hell and shit might be coming down around you but you've got to keep cool and take the time to get it right.'

Forty years had passed since Marko and his lover had been caught stealing a ship.To exploit his piloting skills, the authorities had integrated his mind into the system of a patrol cruiser. Fate was to punish him further. Poisonous memories stung the encased pulp of his brain. The target had been a smuggler's freighter. Marko used his cannons with deadly precision. Cora had been the freighter pilot. The sound of her last breath haunted his systems.

Sickened by consequences and sorrow, Marko felt that regret and hate were all that remained of his human self.

A crescendo of voices came from the living quarters. They were done and would soon be asleep. Marko stared out of the view screen. The beauty of the velvet void and the coloured stars meant little to him. His sensors were fixed on the white burning disc of Vuvouna.

The authorities had sold the cruiser as redundant stock. The sale did not retire or free Marko. How could it? His body had been harvested for organs decades ago. He had been sold along with the ship, like a damned optional extra. Barron and his moxian whore had bought the cruiser and started a lousy haulage business in the ass-pit of the galaxy.

'The worst thing is Barron - ' Marko whispered static. ' - is that you remind me of what I used to be.'

It had taken years. Through endless hours of silently exploring the parameters of the ship's mainframe, Marko discovered a back-door. He reached cautiously with his mind, disabling alarms and signals in miniscule increments. As Barron went about his shit-heeled business, a revolution was going on beneath that metallic hide. Piece by piece, byte by byte, Marko gained control of the ship.

Marko set course and speed. The engines silently pushed the cruiser on towards the sun. The panel before him flashed red. He had disabled the alarms but promised himself to switch them back on once they were close. It would not be fair to let Barron and Adrixa sleep through such a wondrous experience. The steel carcass would ensure that he would be the last to die. The light of Vuvouna filled the cockpit.

Laughter buzzed through his communicator. It was a glorious day - the end of sorrow, the end of suffering.
"Give a man a mask and he will give you the truth."

Eamonn Clarke

The IntervieweE

"First of all I'd like to thank you for giving me this interview."

"Not at all. Just happy to spread the word again."

"Perhaps I could begin by asking how long you have been here?

"In publishing limbo? Well, since the merger I guess. That was 1979, so it's 38 years now."

"Goodness, that long? You don't appear to have aged a day."

"Those are the rules, Super-heroes never age. Not unless some hot-shot, maverick writer wants to write an 'Old man's dark knight returns to his kingdom come' epic. And even then all we get is a mustache and some grey hair at the temples."

"You look great though, love the costume, especially the cape."

"Looks good doesn't it, but just wait until the publishers want a photo-shoot on the roof and the damned wind tries to turn you into a human kite. I did think it might make a good title for my memoirs though. Something like 'The Great E's Cape.' Pretty catchy, eh?"

"You mentioned the merger, I wondered what were your memories of it, did the bosses warn you what was coming?"

"No, the suits said nothing, but we could all see where things were headed. And you can't fool the readers. Doesn't matter if you write 'Great news for all readers inside', everybody knows that just means great stories being dumped and your comic's assets being raided like the city fighting over a dying business."

"What about the role of editor, were you ever in contention for the position?"

"Oh, I was in contention all right, but they'd already sent one alien super-being back off into space. I guess they thought that if they did it again they might be accused of being alienist or something. So old Thargie got the gig, and I was out in the cold with nothing, and I found myself here, twiddling my thumbs with the likes of Misty and Ghastly McNasty."

"Did you resent the Mighty One for carrying on without you?"

""No, I've got no hard feelings against his mightiness. He's done a good job, even if two of his biggest hits have been characters I gave him."

"So, Mr ..."

"Don't say that. All sorts of copyright issues, and it sounds very corny."

"Sorry, Mr Big. What's next for you?"

"I want a story, not just a one off in a summer special or an annual, I want something ongoing, something modern, a story that redefines the genre. With a really good writer, maybe Grant Morrison could do it. He brought back the Red Bee for Grud's sake."

"It's comeback time then?"

"Yes, I'm back and ready to carry a series on these super shoulders. And I want a cover drawn by one of the masters, Bolland or Gibbons. They owe me that at the very least."

"Well, it's been an absolute pleasure chatting to you, sir. I will pass on your comments to the doctors, sorry, the management. Now I think it's time for that injection."

Heath C Ackley

My feeble ruse to get more people to read - and more importantly vote - on this thread has kind of spiralled off on to another thread entirely. So, bringing it back where it belongs, can any of those Twoothy historians out there work from which vintage strip my story originates? The guesses so far are;

The Volunteer from the 1982 Annual

A text story with McCarthy illustrations

Bang bang said the Green Cheese Man from the 1981 Annual.

Three good attempts but no cigar!
"Give a man a mask and he will give you the truth."

Greg M.

Quote from: Heath C Ackley on 13 September, 2017, 04:47:27 PM
So, bringing it back where it belongs, can any of those Twoothy historians out there work from which vintage strip my story originates?

'The Symbiote' from the 1978 Annual.

Heath C Ackley

Aaaand we have a winner! Well spotted Greg.

From all of the great stories and strips that have been in 2000ad over the decades The Symbiote was the one one-off strip I remember enjoying the most as a kid. It seems that no-one knows who the creative team who worked on it were. Any ideas?
"Give a man a mask and he will give you the truth."

NapalmKev

Late Night Phone In.

With a Gun in one hand and a phone in the other, he weighed his options.

"It's everywhere! Don't you see? It's everywhere and it eats. And eats, and EATS AND EATSAND-

"And I'm afraid we'll have to cut you off and hope that you get yourself some help. Let's take another call - What's your name and what's on your mind?"

Name! Not his real one that's for certain. He looked towards his muted TV for inspiration and saw 'Only Fools and Horses', Boom!

"Uh, Hello.. my name's um, Rodney. Yeah, that'll do. Rodney. And the thing is I need to get something of my chest."

"Talk away, Rodney. What's your bother?"

He paused. The Guy's tone, he didn't like it.

"Well, you see..." - Gun in one hand phone in the other - "...I've been Horrible! In the most offensive and inappropriate ways. An all round Bastard! But recently... something's happened."

"Go on, Rod; get it off your chest."

"Yeah, right then." -  Condescending Prick - "I was beating some bloke the other day, different Football team and such, and I had what you might call an "Epiffipy!"

"Do you mean an 'Epiphany', Rod?"

"That's what I said!" - Is he taking the piss? - "Anyhow, I was beating him and I realised to myself that this had been my whole life. Hurting people just because they were different. They didn't think the same things that I did so they got a Slap, you know?... This guy, I had him off the ground, by his throat so to speak, and he was struggling to talk. I loosened up a bit just to hear what he had to say, thought it might be a laugh." - Gun in one hand - "He's spluttering, coughing blood and he says 'My son! He's only little, I have to find him!' -Gun- "I dropped the Guy and legged it..."

"Go on, Rod."

"Yeah." - That's better. A more sombre, respectful tone. But in the end does it really matter? - "As soon as the Match finished we charged outside and waited for the Away fans to exit... Then we rushed them, No quarter given. Thing is they weren't like us, seasoned thugs waving a banner for 'Her Maj', They were families and proper fans, as I've now come to understand, through the News and what have you, the Guy I was choking... his son..." -The decision is made - "I knew then, none of my Bullshit ever mattered. In fact, my Bullshit was not only a waste of my life but also a waste of that Poor FUCKING CHI-

"And I'm afraid we'll have to cut you off and hope that you get yourself some help. Let's take another call - What's your name and what's on your mind?"

Gun.




"Where once you fought to stop the trap from closing...Now you lay the bait!"