Other Literature Di's Literature Emporium

Jack Morgan

Skeletron Prime
Heya there. Y'alls may know me, Di Vyz. Or just Di. Anyhoo, every once in a while I write things that aren't part of one of my stories, so this shall be where they end up. You can also use this thread to ask me questions about my writing, and offer criticism.

I will do requests for stories if I like what you propose, but they may take a while. But without further ado, things!:

THE TALE OF DIGGUMS


‘Ello. My name’s Diggums. Diggums Digsfast. Or, if ya want mah full name:


DIGGUMS DIGSFAST DIGS FASTER THAN… YOU!


Or Diggums, if ya loik.


Oi’m seventy-three years old as of about three months ago. All mah friends say, “Diggums! Retire, you ol’ bum!” Well, Oi say no! Oi’d much rather be digging than doing any ol’ ninny shenanigans. I go to the mines, dig ‘till my hands bleed, dig some more, and then go ta’ the bar and get drunk off mah :red:. ‘Tis a good life. Huh? Wassat? Ya didn’t come here to listen to some old fool ramble, eh? Well, a’ight. Pull up a chair, young’un, and Oi’ll tell you a tale of back in the days of Diggums!


A’ighty… It all started ‘bout forty or so years back, when the summer was so hot it could grill a burger for ya without even havin’ to light a fire. ‘Least, that’s what the boys tell me. Sun-heat don’t get down that deep. And indeed there Oi was, deep in the caves, diggin’! Now, y’ask, what was I diggin’ for down there? Well, matey, they say that deep down in the caves of tha Earth, there lies a glorious city made of pure gold… Now, Oi don’t give a buttered damn about gold, so Oi immediately turned ‘round and headed down mah usual shaft. Now, a good many of the boys don’t loik the ol’ caves that Oi make my living, so it’s noice and lonely down there. And that, boy, is where the true story begins…


Diggums looked around the cave, furrowing his thick orange brow. This cavern was new. He gingerly tapped his pick against the cold stone, listening intently as a faint “Clink!” sound bounced about the chamber. With a grunt, he picked up his lantern, rested his pick against his shoulder, and walked into the void. Magical caves? It only stood to reason that if the cave had brought with it magical new stone, then something else had to be there as well… Magical new metal. Copper, in particular. Diggums loved the metal a great deal, wearing armor made entirely of it, and refused to only ever use his rusty, ancient copper pick. It was also magical beyond belief, but that’s beside the point. Walking through a seemingly endless, twisting tunnel, he started to whistle a tune. He’d forgotten exactly what the tune was, but it had something to do with defiling one’s mother. But all that mattered with mining tunes is that they help you mine, so the meaning is, ironically, meaningless. Diggums was a very good miner; he marked his path carefully with a broken stalagmite -or stalactite, he never could remember the difference. But stalactites weren’t what he was down here to concern himself with, anyway. He was looking for that glint of light that would notify him to his prize.


However, this random cave from nowhere was proving to perhaps not be composed the same as a normal cave. As in, there was no metal here. And so crushing was this realization that Diggums glumly looked into his backpack, and brought out something he kept particularly for such tearjerking situations such as this: A large bottle of vodka. He’d snuck it out of the bar the night before, due to downing his previous supply after it turned out several loads of ore he’d brought out from the mines hadn’t been copper as he’d expected. Oh well, you can’t win them all. He uncorked the bottle, and got about relieving his sadness. But, as he turned around to head home and buy more alcohol, he did see a light, after all. It was not that glint of metal he dreamt of, but from a small side cave he hadn’t noticed before. Fueled by the spirit of adventure and enough vodka to kill an average human, he charged forward, wielding aloft a mighty pickaxe!


Now, Diggums was not one to stop and think of the possibility that what he was seeing was nothing more than a mere illusion generated by the amount of liquid adventure coursing through his blood. Fortunately for him and his face, there actually was a side path, preventing his face from meeting a sudden and painful collision with the wall. Not that it would have been likely to stop him, though. Once Diggums had the trail of treasure, there was no way to stop him. Especially if he was drunk. He never stopped once to question why his destination -the light- was getting farther and farther away. While it can never be certain what’s going on in Diggums’ head, and even moreso if he be drunk, Diggums is not a man to question the odd and suspicious. And true to that, he proceed to sprint down the winding tunnel, trying to catch up to that elusive light. Diggums’ determination did pay off in the end, amazingly. With a mighty clash, he sprang into the light, knocking the both of them onto the ground.


As he picked himself up, he noticed that the mysterious light had been naught but a lantern attached to some kind of wheeled device. His eyes then picked up on a rope, laid in a hoop around his feet. He uttered a short but potent curse, and then the clever trap sprang, leaving him suspended in the air. For a few minutes he just hung there, backpack dangling from his back and pickaxe just barely held in his fist. Whoever had laid the trap didn’t seem to be around, so after a bit he decided to try swinging back and forth to try and grab a wall and work from there. When that didn’t work ( the walls were too far, the setter of the trap had chosen the position well ), he tried to pull his upper body up enough to grab the rope around his ankle. But alas, too many nights of feasting had made his belly a formidable obstacle. Then that gave him an idea. He returned to swinging, but didn’t stop this time. Using his weight to his advantage, he stressed the rope from which he hung with momentum, and was soon rewarded by the sound of snapping fibres. As he swung out again, it occurred to him he was going very, very fast. As the rope finally completely gave way right at the maximum height of his pass, he was sent flying forward with enough speed to kill a man. To make matters worse, the passage soon opened up into a wide ravine. He lost forward momentum, but was falling deep into the earth. And then he reached the bottom.


Fortunately for Diggums, he landed on his backpack. Unfortunately for Diggums, his backpack was full of copper tools and other things that would be painful to land on. Rubbing his aching back, he pulled himself to his feet and took a look at his surroundings. It was a lot darker down here than in the upper section of the cave, and he could feel that the earth’s heat was far stronger than usual. A normal man would curse his luck, but Diggums grinned. Farther down you go, the more metal there is to be found. And thus, with a glint in his eye and a spring in his step, Diggums Digsfast readied his pickaxe and strode off into depths unknown!

Jack bent over, supporting himself on a nearby rock. Blood was pouring in a steady trickle down his leg, and he was more tired than he ever had been before. But he was still alive, and seemed to have lost his pursuer. He sighed, sinking slowly to the ground and tearing a length of cloth from his shirt to serve as a makeshift bandage. The waves in front of him crashed gently into the rocky shore, almost tranquil in comparison to the insanity of the island. He was alive, though. Staggering uneasily to his feet, he began the last stretch of the journey, to the Citadel. That was where he’d find his out of this crazy game, and make his way back home. At least that’s what he’d been told. The only thing standing between him and freedom was it. He didn’t even know what it was, but it had chased him from one corner of the island to the other. Fortunately, it seemed to have been wounded by a trap that Jack had laid for it, but he wasn’t sure. Either way, he had to keep moving. The sun was casually drifting down under the horizon, which didn’t bode well for him. He found a small branch and used it to support his injured leg, and pushed forward, almost fearlessly. Almost. Truth was, he was terrified to the very core. But under the fear there was a deep sense of survival, and that drove him forward. After a minute of stumbling through darkness, his eyes finally met the soft glow of a street lamp, and the Citadel was mere yards away from him, surrounded by several cherry trees in bloom. But before he could gleefully dash into the gleaming tower, a cold voice resounded behind him.


“Not. Quite. So. Fast.”


Jack turned around, his blood freezing into slush inside his veins. The voice chuckled, and a dark shape advanced slowly, backing him onto the dock of a small pond. By now the sun had slipped away, blanketing the island in a cold night. Jack almost stumbled as his foot met the edge of the dock, but regained his balance. Sakura leaves slowly drifted down from the tree branches, blanketing the pond in a soft pink coat. The figure continued to advance, keeping a steady hand on the weapon tucked into a sheath on his back. Jack’s heart beat like a drum inside his chest, and he knew that he was about to die. The figure drew even closer, and Jack clenched his eyes shut, preparing himself for the fatal blow. He felt the figure’s breath on his cheek, and words were spoken.


“Heh… Ya got me good, kid…”


With that, a splash sound greeted Jack’s ears, and he slowly opened his eyes. A black shape was gliding across the surface of the water, and in the faint glow of the lamps he saw a thick trail of blood following it. Jack collapsed to the ground, sobbing with pain and relief. After his eyes would produce no more tears, he climbed up, and limped into the Citadel.

The final Pillar crackled and hissed, slowly fading back into the ethereal void from which I could only assume it came from. Pain still coursed through my body, and what little function my brain could still perform was distracted by the whispers and purrs that drifted about me. But all of that was drowned out by the terrible feeling coating my entire body with fear. Drearily gazing into my mirror to return to my base, my vision shook and quaked. I shuffled into the large, shoddily constructed building, clutching my Vortex Beater hard enough to cut my palm and draw a small amount of blood. I barely even noticed the pain. Impatiently shoving a handful of coins into the Nurse’s hands, I impatiently gulped down the few pills she gave me in return. It helped with the pain, at least. Stumbling outside, I muttered a stream of curses as I hit my toe against a rock. This was going fabulously, I could already tell. I gasped as my vision shook again, almost throwing me off balance. Two. I didn’t have long, now. I pulled out a shimmering, multi-colored apple and took a large bite. I mounted the shimmering steed that appeared before my very eyes and pulled a few clips of ammo made with the strange stuff the Crimson monsters had dropped. The stuff appeared to soften armor, so I figured it was probably in my best interests to use it. If my past experiences had taught me anything, that thing’s hide was pretty tough. Ech, anyway, back to the point. I rode the unicorn to the large strip I’d dug out days before, and waited. And then I felt the universe bending around me, and there it was. In a brilliant flash of light, a giant man cut off at the waist towered over me, and I started running. I’d heard stories and seen pictures, but the huge being behind me still took my breath away. It was scary, sure, but apparently this big ol’ guy dropped the best loot around. I’d seen it a little with my own two eyes: A man had shot an entire Flying Dutchman out of the sky with only a second of concentrating with a lil’ crystal no bigger than my hand. I had to get my hands on some of that. After making a suitable amount of distance to the guy, I set my mount on a path directly ahead and turned around to fire up on the thing’s hands. Or rather, the eyes inside the hands. Don’t ask me, I don’t make this stuff up. I just kill it. After making what I would say was a considerable amount of damage to one of the eyes, it opened the one in the middle of its head and sent out a big ol’ beam. As I prepared to jump off the unicorn and let my wings carry me to safety, it made itself painfully aware that I had not made my track quite long enough. As my unicorn hit a wall head on, I was tossed through the air before I could react. And then a giant laser passed over me, incinerating my body and crushing my dreams at the same time. I woke up in my bed after a short blackout, and grumpily got up to go do it all over again. Great.


*Based on a true story.

That's all I got for now. More things will probably end up here eventually. Oh wait, I might need this sometime:

Still waiting.

And this, perhaps:

Ask things, mortals.

Alright, now I'm done.
 
Back
Top Bottom