The Morelli Bros. (Chapter I, Part VII)

Posted on March 16, 2015 by R. Richardsson

“…unngh…”

There it was again. That awful, low growling from behind him. It shook him to the core, making him tremble from fear, and he was frozen where he stood. Not one of his well-trained muscles would respond to his commands, he couldn’t even lift so much as a finger. He could only think imagine the horror creeping upon him.

He could feel it looming over him, omnipresent and powerful. His mind refused to accept anymore information, the strangeness of it all was suddenly too much.

“Luigi,” he screamed. At that moment, he knew that he couldn’t do this alone. Whatever this was, he needed something familiar. More than any other time in his life, he needed his lanky, clumsy, little brother at his side.

“….oooombaaa….”

It was the same guttural whisper. It sounded like it was only a few feet behind him, maybe closer, but he remained powerless to face it. He could hear the grass rustling as it approached. Dry leaves crunched beneath its feet, but even worse was the smell. The air had shifted. A warm breeze carried it around him, permeating his clothes and senses.

It smelled of rotten vegetation, and something much more sinister. It was something akin to meat that had turned sour as it readied itself for the inevitable maggots which would soon inhabit it.

“Mario! Jump, man!”

It was Luigi who broke him from the spell. Just like that, the fear was gone, and his instincts took over. It was as when they were children, practicing Parkour and showing up all the other children in their neighborhood. His right hand became a fist. He bent slightly at the knees, and with a powerful thrust upward, he leapt.

“Ah-haa,” he exclaimed involuntarily. It was a sound that came unbidden, much like the kiai used by martial artists, and it strengthened his maneuver. The ground fell away from him as he was propelled one, two, four feet into a standing jump. He watched it fall away with a sense of wonder, surprised at the power behind it, and for a split second he felt free, however short-lived the feeling would be.

At that moment, the source of his trepidation made its ambling appearance.

He barely had any time to think about it, for as soon as it was in his sight, so had he begun his rapid descent to earth. His feet touched down on its chitinous, slimy, debris covered head. He felt, rather than heard, something snap beneath him, as the autumn colored creature was compressed by his weight.

There was a gush of black inchor that spread in all directions, and two white orbs blew out from beneath the cap in front of him. He retched when he realized it was the creature’s eyes. One had turned slightly upwards, glaring at him accusingly from the dark splatter it now rested in.

Then, as the thick head of the creature reached the ground, it pushed up like a spring, launching him a couple of feet up and away from the creature’s body. As before, his training took over when he hit the ground, allowing him to land in a crouch that absorbed the shock from his fall.

“M- M- Mario! Behind-a you!”

He still hadn’t found his brother in the overgrowth, but he trusted in him enough that finding him would come second to his concerns. He spun around to face the direction from which the creature had come, only to see a dozen more like it approaching. They were shaped, oddly enough, like mushrooms. Much like the hard shell of the first one, their heads were covered in various degrees of slime and rotten vegetation, and they glared at him with impossibly large eyes.

My Friend, My Love, My Creation

Posted on March 16, 2015 by R. Richardsson

Most times, new characters are born rather beautifully. They come with rich back-stories and have a deep family history. They speak to me for hours about who they are, where they live, what they do for a living, etc. Other times, they burst forth kicking and screaming.

They’re wearing straight-jackets and slamming themselves madly against my psyche. They’re roughly cut from raw emotion, they know very little about who they are, where they came from, or who their families are. The only thing they know is their desire to have the same chance at life as the aforementioned.

While I do so enjoy the company of my more ‘fleshed’ out characters, mainly because they are familiar to me, like family or good friends, I find myself oddly drawn to these new beings. They want the same things that we all have, that which has come so easily to their cousins; a life of their own. They are like children, in a way. They don’t know what’s behind them, nor do they have a clue what’s ahead of them. They must learn, through my guidance, of course, what they like or do not like.

Sometimes I can control the process. Sometimes, I can even help form them into something appropriate enough to tell a story about. This isn’t always the case, however, and any writer can tell you that it isn’t always going to be a good thing.

You’re not always going to have a ‘good’ character. Every so often, as I am helping this character come to life, we discover that he or she isn’t so savory a person. Maybe said character is a villain? Or maybe, something much, much, worse. I don’t always like telling the story of these characters, but again, as a writer I don’t always have a choice. They desire a chance at life. They demand that their story be heard. And as a storyteller, I am compelled to share.

Perhaps what awaits in the end is poetic? Or, perhaps not. It isn’t for me to decide. You see, much like the character types I have described, so too do the stories exist as well. Some lay in wait, ready to pounce my thoughts without a moment’s notice. Other times, they are a rough gem that needs worked into something you may or may not appreciate.

Just as is the case of the character, some stories may be beautiful designs that inspire you to continue turning the page. Others might be an atrocious train-wreck that forces you to turn the pages until you reach the end. This isn’t to say that they aren’t very good.

It’s a tricky subject; horror.

What one person may consider good, might be another’s kryptonite. I may have written the most descriptive decapitation in such a way that you have never seen before, but what may make one jump out of his/her seat in excitement, might have another turning their head in disgust.

Such is life.

By now, I hope that my readers have come to expect a certain style to my writing. You’ve survived the first two tales of John Rizzerio and are eagerly waiting the finale, or you have been keeping up with my webseries and are looking for the next post to appear. You know that I don’t always pull the punches.

Some of my characters may seem like somebody you could run into on the street. Others, a friendly neighbor or work acquaintance. Then there are those, like the protagonists of ‘She Has A Pretty Face Though’, and ‘The Box’, who each have their own issues to resolve. In the end, was their story worth it? Was it poetic, or did you enjoy following their journey?

Of course, you’ll have your own opinions that I would LOVE to hear! But, in the end, I will still continue to tell the stories as they demand to be told, in their own entireties. While I depend upon you, my faithful readers, to help guide me down the path of your interests, I hope that you continue to stick with me as I share with you my creations. They are a labor of love, a part of myself in much the same way that my children are, and it gives me great pleasure to be able to introduce you to them.

They are family, after all.

The Morelli Bros. (Chapter I, Part VI)

Posted on March 13, 2015 by R. Richardsson

It was his sense of sound that returned first. Even before he felt it on his skin, the grass and leaves sighed as a warm breeze brushed past them. Somewhere in the distance, a bird chirruped playfully, calling out to whomever would listen to its song. What darkness had once surrounded him was gone, chased away by the natural light of the sun.

“How long was I out,” he wondered.

His body ached, bruised from the rubble that had battered him in the alley. Slowly, he pushed himself into a sitting position, balled his hands into fists, and ground them into his eyes as he attempted to chase away the cobwebs.

When he opened his eyes, the light stabbed into them like red-hot daggers. His vision was blurry, but what he could see was nothing short of confusing. A sea of green surrounded him, undulating softly to and fro in the wind. His head barely poked over the tips of the soft blades of grass, which he could now identify by its fresh smell, something he hadn’t experienced since he was a boy.

“Luigi!”

As his vision swam into focus, he could see that he was indeed in the middle of the richest pasture he had ever laid eyes upon. The grass was deep emerald, and as he rose to his feet, he discovered that it reached nearly to his waist. Though the ground around his immediate area was flat, he soon learned that he was between two lines of hills that sharply rose and fell to either side of him.

“Luigi,” he hollered again as a sinking feeling began to grow inside of him. The last thing he remembered, before being swallowed by the darkness, was the look in his brother’s eyes as he slipped away. It was the fear of a man who know he was going to die.

He turned, and what he saw next stopped him in his tracks. Suddenly, the desperation was pushed aside, the need to find his sibling, forgotten. For, before him was something that in all his years as a plumber, had never existed until this moment.

Mario Morelli, son of Rocco and a master of his trade in his own right, was staring into the five foot diameter opening of a green steel pipe. There was only a few feet in before it dropped off into the ground, but it was the sign over the opening that gave him more cause for concern. In bold letters, in a font he didn’t recognize, was a word he could easily read.

EARTH

“…unngh…”

He didn’t have long to ponder the implications, for behind him, something was shambling toward him.