Clicking Keys

A new story I’ve begun to write. I decided to share the first chapter.

Introduction:

‘There’s a sound of whistling that livens up the air. A brilliant sun beautifully shines onto our city made of white. It’s a glorious day; the kind you would want to roll your r’s on. The banners of the Capital flow gently. The white background helps the deepest black lines feel as though reach into it to infinity. Everything is magnificent, everything is pure. Today is however, one of mourning. A day of suffering has to come about eventually and today is the most perfect day for such a thing. Because the King is dead. But he was no monarch. The old man was the most respected kind of man. A man who was a commander of men. The one who united the sparse warring states and created true subsistence. A legendary hero. He was also a peadophile. But everyone has their vices, ha.

From where I’m standing. I see only the shores of oblivion that’s masked in a paint of white. Today even those who live outside the capital were allowed entrance. It was the first time they’ve ever seen anything so magnificent. But for someone like me. Well… It’s just like a sponge soaking in all the colour. Bit clean. So dull. I stood by my King’s side till his bitter end. He was struggling to breath, like his lungs were trapped in a vacuum. Oh the mercifuls to make someone like him suffer. It would have been better to put him out of his misery. I was tempted. So many were around. I know we all thought the same thought. I didn’t want him to die though, even if it sounds that way. I’m not heartless, just… honest. How could a man like he who survived to old age only live to become weaker and weaker? It’s been a millennia since there’s been a man of such elderly grace. He whispered into my ear while holding my hand. “D-do-don’t fail.” And just like that, he fall back, no more breath left. They all rushed to me, begging to know his final words. And now I hold the power.

So I stand above all the kingdom of man and see the light of life in each and everyone below. They speak out with such gratitude, I’m sure they do. How they must envy all in this city, envy me. But now, I am their king. Their most virtuous and graceful. I stand on a precipice without the aid of a wall to catch me. And I stand strong. I gather my breath in my lungs so strong that they will never fail on me.

“Ourrr King had passed. A man of such vigor and knowledge has never bequeathed such sordid fools like we in the history of our kind. Since our ancestors built these walls to protect morbid little selves, we’ve been protected. Ourrrr King brought about great change. We are better for it. No longer will the royal houses be at war. We are united in our struggle. The very same as you. Long live our King. Long live our dear Paradisa!”

A rumage of sounds breaks between all those tiny spots below me. My glorrrious speech, it’s words may have fallen on deaf ears. If only those ants would know the words I speak, they could live inside these protected walls. The time is nigh. I’m given a bow and arrow that I pull as far back as I can. I let go and a scream erupts from the crowd below. “A worthy sacrifice must be given from the unseen man! Long live the King!”

And so it’s time for the long walk to commence for my dear old master and friend. His final resting stop at the sanctuary of the Merciful awaits at the end of the trail. A tear slowly falls down my eye as I see his coffin being carried on the backs of my most gracious Knights of White. All of our kind, or what’s left of it, is standing on either side, leaving room for passage. He was a great man. The kindest and most generous and righteous. I won’t fail him.

A crashing sound of the coffin dropped reverberates through the air. Blasphemy. The body rolls out of the wooden confines and crashes to the floor. The emeralds on all our necks throw in the air as we flail our arms, screaming down at the folly of those for such a fuck-up. The crowd piles together. Chaos ensues. My knights! My king! Fighting must have broken out. They all want a piece of such a blessed body. His skin is too good for them. Wretched fools only want a piece of him as an ornament of luck to prey.’

The eyes of wolves stare at the back of the new King Klaus. They all watch on, wondering if the time is right to push him off his pedestal. But his reign as only just begun and a dead king will only cause chaos. Those below don’t believe in the spirit of the nation. They have another name for it all. A single word in fact. They call it, ‘Nier’. A word in their language that means the most unfortunate of things. They tear at the departed king with their nails like claws, ripping into the decaying flesh and pulling up the wrinkled skin with all their pent up anger. They tear at what’s left of what once was a man. They fight one another to get a piece, they want to destroy!

While the knights carried the coffin, in the front of the crowd to the left was a young girl with long flowing blonde hair and soft blue eyes. The new monarch couldn’t see from his height, the intricacies of what was occurring below. The tension, the scratching heads and the clenching fists. Only those on the ground could see the stones in their hands. It was an atmosphere the knights knew well. Not all the lords are so foolish to think themselves as great. They very well knew such anger would blight the festival for the dead. No man, woman or child wanted to be the first to make a blow on the knights. A million thoughts crossed their minds as the group mentality of all of man faded into doubt. What would happen to them? Not all the lords were so foolish. Only four knights walked the path. A trickle of a force to hoist such a coffin of deadweight - while tens of thousands stayed behind the barrier between the courtyard to the most inner city. Where they all stood was a limbo between the two cities.

The young girl watched the knights carefully, seeing the fear in their eyes. Each and everyone of them knew this was suicidal. The mission they were given masked in honour and respect. She raised her arm, holding a rock larger than her first. She threw it with all her force, as much s her tiny body could muster. She threw it so hard, she fell to the floor. The knight she hit fell too.

On that day - a King’s honour was lost. But the anger of the masses was squashed. And just like that, life went on for everyone. There were those that subsisted and those that reaped all the rewards. Just as it has always been…

The riot carried till night where the knights behind the gate almost matched those still left around in number. Their orders are never to kill. And so they pushed what was left of rebellion back into their quadrant, a home away from theirs. Their shields were bloodied by end but swords were not. Just as it’s always been.

And in the early night, all the noises of man stopped. Those still wanting a fight ran back home in fear. Because just like everyday, it’s been like it’s always been. A fear of the unknown - the noises of the inhumans were all that could be heard.

The protagonist and the antagonist. These forces aren’t counter opposites - the antagonist is bigger and better than the protagonist. They don’t necessarily have to be evil. They just have to be more complete than the protagonist.

The protagonist has to one-up his antagonist. Taking all the strengths of their enemy, overcoming and ultimately defeating them. But the antagonism doesn’t have to be a person. It could even be a concept. Fear for instance is an internal antagonism. Something that needs to be overcome. Maybe for survival? An external conflict could simply be someone who wants to destroy your life. How do you overcome someone or something that is already motivated and in the act? How do you overcome fear?

There’s a story in everything.

In every image you see - it’s the narrative that speaks out to you. It makes everything engaging. Even in a line.

Aristotle Prose is an obviously old concept. The main thought behind it is simply, that the plot is more important than character. This theory was from the days before the real “long-form” of storytelling. The novella and the novel: what they are isn’t simply a short story or a long story. The character and the shift - the change and the subtleties. How does one develop a story within these two structures.

The novella is in essence plot: the change of a character over the period of the story culminated by the choice - most often singular. The shift and the change. There’s not much room for evolution in character, but there is the ability to quickly tell the story. But even within a story like this there must be a need. 

The novel is in essence a look at character: there’s a shift and a motivation. An evolution and development of a character and multiples of. Aristotle’s Prose doesn’t work in this quadrant unless you want a slow trawl. Characters, characters, characters.

One thing I’ve learned in years of writing is the importance of characters. There is no need for the plot to be the end-all with good characters. The “long-form” is like a seed that’s planted in the ground. You nuture it and it grows, and there are branches the span outwards in all directions. You can take your pick of what you want to happen to characters in this way. You have the ability to focus on the choice. And those choices are multiple. It’s that which makes the character become real. 

Writing for money is an odd thing. It’s almost a certainty that you would want to get paid for your own creative work that you spent so long cultivating. In all my years, I’ve realised that the tremendously hard work of the written word is the first step to becoming a successful author.

I say this as someone who isn’t sucessful at all. Without the bullshit; trying to prop oneself up with a pretentious stick up the arse and prove you are something - you can finally talk clearly. In the prose of most writers that I’ve ever seen, the words don’t come from character but from their own unconfidence. I do the same. It’s learning to conquer ones emotions that you can write something good. 

Writing for money is a structured event. A brief that requires many specifics and an Editor that might be impossibly hard to appease. You have to write in a prose that isn’t your own, a third-person act where you’re pulling your own strings. It’s not interesting.

Books or screenwriting? I’ve done so many pieces of writing, I can barely remember them all. Since I was 14, sitting in my bedroom. Beaten down by agoraphobia, staring at my monitor with drying eyes, everyday. English and writing were my escape. I wasn’t a mediocre student until Secondary School. That’s where I became a complete and utter failure of a human being. I was weak because of everything around me. Kicked into the mud (literally) and had scratches and scrapes from the violence I had to endure and live with from the people around me. I was never an optimist though. And that’s what struck me about writing. You can write a million words that can all fall into an abyss, never to be seen again - no one ever to ever observe your thoughts and feelings. But none of it matters. It’s brutal. But I’m brutal too. I just want to read a good story; so I need to write a good story. Then at 15, I tried hard. Writing thousands of words a day - thousands and thousands of terribly written things. Back when I lived in my tiny bubble, in my closet-sized bedroom. I fantasized about these gigantic worlds I couldn’t describe; emotional stories that were nonsense and just generally odd ramblings. 

Writing to me has always been a challenge. What’s life without the threat of failure? What’s life without the persistence to just keep trying? My improvement in writing is like the improvement of my psyche. A hardened resilience - learning to just keep pushing. Because throughout all those dark and misty times: like a character in their darkest hour - there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. But life is many lights.

Hi, I’m Brenden. 

I think of myself as a fairly decent writer/screenwriter and I’m making this blog as a sort of vain promotion. I’ll be talking about my work, my process, what I’ve done and what I’m doing. First I’ll focus on my older works; the mistakes and the qualities I hoped to imbibe into my stories. And show pieces of my newer works.