M'kay, I need your help folks! I started to write a short story starring Kouen this afternoon that takes place recently after the events of BioC (which I still have to write... TT;) Frankly, I'm totally stuck! I have the story below. If you have any suggestions as to what happens next, please let me know! I would really REALLY appreciate your feedback! (Also, this is a first draft. Please ignore any crappy grammar or redundancies ^ ^;) ------------------------------------------------------------------- �Minerva, can I ask you something?� Queried Kouen early one morning as he was getting dressed. �Of course.� the attendant replied as she began to brush his hair. �Well, remember when I was little you used to tell me stories about mer people?� She nodded. �...Are they real?� Minerva smiled and stood up. �Many years ago people believed they existed. My grandfather used to tell me a story about the time he thought he saw a mermaid. No one believed him.� �Do you think they�re real?� �...Why are you so interested?� Unable to come up with a good answer, Kouen simply said, �Oh, no reason....� Actually, the night before Kouen discovered and old book in his father�s library. Inside were the tales of many creatures that lived beneath the sea, mermaids included. He didn�t read much, but from that book he learned that mermaids supposedly lived in seas and large lakes, and were said to cause sailors to crash their ships... Surely such interesting beings weren�t as malevolent as the text described? With his interest piqued, Kouen quickly tried to think of a way he could learn more. A whimsical idea came to him. �...What if I went to Jere Lake? It�s big and deep and no one goes there anymore...� he pondered. Jere Lake was a large body of water not too far from home. Perhaps he could have some luck finding what he was looking for there. �Hey, Minerva?� �Yes, Kouen.� �...Where did your grandfather say he saw the mermaid?� �Jere Lake.� **** This was too good to be true. Okay, so this whole deal about mermaids could be entirely fictional, but what if it wasn�t? Kouen couldn�t exactly explain to himself why he was so fascinated or determined, but by now his mind was already developing a way to explore the depths of the lake. The very next day Kouen woke up late. Minerva was gone. After getting himself dressed and groomed he went downstairs to eat. He spotted a note. �...She�ll be gone until tomorrow? Where does she go all the time?!� Kouen muttered. Soon however, his feelings of annoyance quickly faded as he realized, �-She�ll be gone...until tomorrow!� Barely believing his incredible luck, he quickly packed a lunch and sped out the door. An hour later Kouen was standing at the edge of a large expanse of water. He was a bit tired, but walking there was worth it. Jere Lake was surrounded by a great mixed wood forest, and strangely, it was almost entirely uninhabited. �This is going to be a good day...� Kouen said as he gazed up at the bright afternoon sky. Small waves lapped at his feet, and he took a few steps back to avoid getting them wet. He paused for a minute to enjoy a slight breeze that ruffled his golden hair, and then began what he came here to do. Within an instant, he created a large crystal-clear sphere that was slightly taller than he was. Kouen smiled, walked over to it, and gave the orb a quick hug before he proceeded to slip inside. How he could instantaneously go from touching the surface to going through it was beyond him. He just knew it was possible. Now inside, Kouen looked around. Strangely he could see perfectly fine without any distortion whatsoever. �Well, here I go...� Kouen took a few steps forwards and the bubble rolled with him. He kept going until he was floating a few metres from the shore. It was hard to stay balanced, mostly because he wasn�t stepping on anything solid. The membrane of the sphere stretched beneath his shoes, forcing him to descend a few inches underneath the water�s surface. Regardless, he trudged on and stopped walking when he was roughly fifty feet from the beach. He was exerting too much energy trying to stay upright, so Kouen decided to carefully sit down. The water underneath him was cold, but that wasn�t his biggest concern. �...How am I supposed to get down?� Full of air, the bubble he was in certainly wasn�t about to sink on its own any time soon. �Aaargh!� Kouen stood back up and jumped in place, but nothing really happened. He slipped and fell, and without getting up for a second time he began to think. �...It�s so obvious!� Kouen exclaimed as he slapped his own forehead. �All I have to do is...� He focussed. In his mind�s eye, he envisioned his sphere sinking. Kouen felt a slight change in depth, and shouted out in surprise when he realized what was happening. Kouen was descending! Kouen got to about twenty-five feet below the surface of the water before he halted his sinking. He concentrated again, and made the sphere move forwards. After a few minutes of experimenting, Kouen could effectively control where he was going. �Deeper...� -------------------------------------------------------------- WHAT WILL HAPPEN NEXT?! O[]O' -------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------- ===My Sketch Blog=== http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=Aristole UPDATED CONSTANTLY -------------------------------------------------------------- ===Art Trades & Collabs=== YES! 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Jude burst in through the doors of the Galleria Mall looking flustered. Once again, he had slept in and was in his usual hurry to meet his friends before they began to worry about him. As he rushed for the food court, he spotted someone by the fountain. It was M, a new student at his school with who shared an English class. She mostly stayed quiet and kept to herself, but today she had her head in her hands and was crying. Quickly disregarding his lateness for the opportunity to make a friendly acquaintance, Jude walked over to her. M�s glasses were hanging off a finger and her short brown hair was looking messier than usual. Jude spoke up. �Hey.� M immediately wiped her eyes, placed her glasses back on and looked up. �...Hi...� �What�s the matter?� he asked casually. With a little sniffle, M said,�Oh...m-my cat... it passed away...� He knelt down in front of her. �Aww, sorry to hear that...� �I...It�s nothing...� �Not that kinda stuff! I used to have a goldfish. Cool little guy, but he only lived for about a day.� She gave him a forced smile. �Shame...� �I�ll never forget him, but you can�t dwell on stuff that�s already happened. You�ll get depressed and...� he struggled to think of an appropriate word. �...stuff.� M giggled. �I guess you�re right. Thanks.� She was no longer crying, so Jude stood up to leave. �No problem!� M grabbed his hand. �Wait!� He stopped, and M quickly shuffled around in her bag. She pulled out a pack of gum. �Here.� M said as she shoved it into his hand. �...What for?� he asked. �Just because... For being nice to me I guess.� �Cool. Thanks!� With that, he said goodbye with a smile, and resumed the hurried task of meeting his friends. �Where were you?� asked Jen as Jude lazily slumped into his usual seat. �Just giving some words of wisdom to that new girl.� Jonesy perked up immediately. �You mean the bookworm?� �Got free gum from her too!� he proudly announced. Upon inspecting the package, he found that it was brand new and blue raspberry-flavoured. He quickly popped a piece into his mouth, eager to make his tongue a shade of cobalt. It had a strong flavour and was sugary to the point of almost being unbearable, but Jude kept chewing. The intense sweetness had to subside eventually. Wyatt noticed his unusual concentration. �Something wrong?� he asked. Jude shook his head. Jen then started explaining to everyone how glad she was that it was the weekend due to her boss overworking her, but Jude was pretty much zoned out (which wasn�t something that took anyone by surprise). Something was a bit strange about this gum. He had been chewing for what seemed like a good ten minutes as his friends chatted around him without saying a word, but it tasted exactly like it did the moment he put it in his mouth. He turned and glanced off in another direction and was intent on chomping out the flavour of it. �...Jude?� He snapped to attention. Jonesy was staring at him. �...I said �do you want to grab a bite at Wonder Taco?� Jude looked around. Everyone else was gone. �Yeah, sure.� A short while later Jude held the delicious delicacy in his hand, but didn�t seem that excited to eat it. As he kept at his gum-chewing he spotted Michelle about to walk past. She noticed him as well, waved, and said �...makes great Bs, too...� Jonesy stood up at once. �Hey, what�s up?� he said smoothly, trying to be as suave as possible. �Wanna go see a movie, or-� �Your fly�s undone.� Michelle interrupted. He glanced down and indeed it was. Turning red while Jude started laughing, Jonesy quickly zipped it back up. He regained his composure, but M was long gone. �Darnit!� After a few minutes of Jonesy�s sulking, they were rejoined by the others. Jude�s taco remained untouched. �You still have that gum?� Nikki queried. �Uh huh. It�s weird. Flavour�s not going away� he muttered in response. He then remembered what M had said to him before. Jude flattened the gum against his tongue, took a breath, and blew. An unusually bright blue bbl began to swell from his lips. �She was totally right!� he thought happily. Jude kept working at making it as big as possible, and prepared himself for it to pop and splatter sticky goo all over his face. Eight inches was his record with a single piece of gum, and the B had just surpassed it. The others began to catch on to what he was doing and decided to watch him. �Wow, Jude. That�s huge!� Caitlin exclaimed. Jude�s muffled response was, �I know, this stuff rocks!� Wyatt stated �I have a feeling he isn�t going to quit any time soon...� �Nope!� The gang watched as it grew and grew. At one point Nikki and Jonesy started making pets about when it would pop. Finally at a massive twenty four inches Jen spoke up. �Jude! That thing�s bigger than your head! You should stop. I know I�m not going to help pick it all off you when it breaks.� �Okay...� Jude reluctantly muttered. He tried to withdraw it back into his mouth, but it was impossible because the B had sealed itself when he spoke. The only way to get it off now was to pop it. With some quick thinking he took a random fork from his pocket. �Hey, look at it now!� Jude stopped and stared at the huge orb dangling from his mouth. For whatever reason, the B had lost its dull sheen and now looked much more transparent and glossy. �Dude!� Jude shouted, and the B lost its grip and fell to the table. It made one slow bounce and just rested there, fat and almost looking content with itself. �This is too weird...� Caitlin commented. Jude was positively intrigued. He poked lightly at the B with his fork a few times but nothing happened, much to everyone�s surprise. His second, slightly harder attempt did nothing either. �What the...� he muttered as he prodded it with a finger. It was perfectly smooth and soft rather than sticky. �This is really weird! What does it say on the package?� Jen demanded. He fumbled around for it, and quickly read it over a few times. Aside from the brand name, flavour, and a few graphics, there was nothing to explain why Jude�s B was like this.
