Finding old stuff you wrote is awesome.

[Karak]

I was looking for tax info and found an old writing folder.
This was something I wrote in 6th grade for my teach Lynn Summers.

Can I stand still as a world dies? I do not know. I look down at the paper before me, I see the numbers, I feel their weight, reflecting the end of so many lives, of so many family trees and their descendant generations. A forest of the innocent, snuffed out by a fire out of control and out of nowhere.
Can I stand still as a world dies? The answer perplexes me as a puzzle with no key and no lock perplexes a mind. As if I held a match and the flame burnt downward ignoring convection and instead was attracted to the gravity of the world beneath it. A single match who’s living flame drops down and hits the earth at my feet and begins this out of control fire that rages around me ignoring all the rules. The puzzle is of my own doing, and as it laughs at the rules laid down by Einstein and Krumpft, by the alien Tru-che and the Great Learner, the weight bears down on my eyelids, forcing them closed like a wall of black silk removes the performers from the stage. I cannot even see the entirety of the puzzle.
But I know I must.
Can I stand still as a world dies?
The answer is in my actions. I stand and leave the entrenched room, no longer paused within my safe hold. Like a womb where the protecting mother’s body saves us from harm it is no longer safe for me.
The world I see is one that looks as if it should be at peace. But it is not. Men move as ants in a chaotic frenzy, the nest laid bare before the fire, they move to save what they can.
So I move.
To save a world.
The puzzle begins to unravel as I answer the question. The actors return to the stage, the curtain is withdrawn.
No I cannot stand still as a world dies.
And I will not.

Karak “The Black”
Days Marching 435 Second Sundown


I did not remember writing it until I read this. Man that was AGES ago.

[Kelegacy]

You smoke a lot of weed as a sixth grader?

That's really good writing, though. I think in sixth grade I was writing kiddie stuff--all action, no substance. Even in high school it was C-list crap...and my private stuff seemed to always have my friends in it as characters, and myself. But in college I seemed to bloom. It was really really strange. I guess I should thank my creative writing workshops and classes.

[Karak]

You smoke a lot of weed as a sixth grader?

That's really good writing, though. I think in sixth grade I was writing kiddie stuff--all action, no substance. Even in high school it was C-list crap...and my private stuff seemed to always have my friends in it as characters, and myself. But in college I seemed to bloom. It was really really strange. I guess I should thank my creative writing workshops and classes.

hahaha.:)
Nope never touched weed. Probably just had too much time on my hands.
I found about 18 chapters, I am reading through it now. It's amazing what you write when you are a kid and then forget about.

[Karak]

With blank stare came into view
Soulless husks two by two
Atop a casket where
My body rested forever there

And the first ever story I had my namesake in. 1987 baby. Good year. I think most of these are DND inspired. Hence the Sea Troll variation.

With the cold hard eyes of a man who wielded death like others the sword, Karak looked over the ruined wagon and the strewn skeletons without pity. Smoldering embers still burnt in the ancient creature-like cartilage of the wagon ribs. The big horse drawn wagon had been torn asunder and flipped onto its side, by creatures of incredible strength. Deep grooves, tore by the broken wheels of the wagon had half-filled with mud choked water and stank of blood and bile, and thick flapping footprints ringed the carnage like mad dancers had celebrated the destruction.

Trolls, Karak thought to himself scanning the forest to his left then the sea to his right. Sea Trolls, cousins to their forest dwelling brethren, had been attacking passing caravans with increasing frequency. A small trail, no more than a flattening of the brown ground underneath the foliage showed where the trolls had hidden in wait for the caravan. They had attacked quickly; barely a human footprint marked the ground. Most of the men had been riding in the wagon or on horses and had little time to defend themselves. The caravan had been slayed, weapons taken, and items pilfered before they could offer what token resistance showed in a few crossbow barbs stuck into trees near the ambush point.

The Trolls had struck with the accuracy and speed of lightning.
The humans had been sold out.
There was no doubt that the Trolls knew the caravan was coming in advance. Their attack was too distinct, too precise for the unintelligent creatures that they were. Kneeling near the dirt, Karak looked for clues as to what had happened. For a trace of his new enemy, a hint of his new prey. For three months he had been chasing the creature known only as the Sealord and his nefarious minions. He had caught up with them in Riverby and if not for the treachery of another would have ended the Sealord’s life there and then. It had taken him nearly a month to track them back down and get this close. He would not lose them again.
Few escaped Karak’s rage.
No one escaped his fury.

Amongst the dirt and mud splattered, broken wood, Karak found what he was looking for. He plucked the debris from the dirt and brought it to his nose and sniffed it.
Seaweed.
The Sealord had been here as well.
The attack was more than a day old but the seaweed still clang with the stink of saltwater and brine. He dropped it and rubbed his fingers together. The oil remained. His hard chiseled features tightened in disgust and he dabbed a bit of dirt on his hand to remove the oil. He stood then, a tall lean specimen of a hunter. His body was lithe and held the waiting energy of a coiled spring. His black hair was cut short and dark as charcoal. His face had been chiseled by an artist who worked in marble and hated placing emotions other than distaste and hate on his work. His eyes, like slivers of glaciers, showed no emotion as he looked over the destruction of so many innocents.
“So?” A whisper above the wind cut through Karak’s thoughts.
The owner of the voice was sitting astride a small black roan. Thin gray robes encapsulated a slender male youth. The horse nervously kicked the ground as its rider calmed it with a yellow tinted hand. Markus Rhall covered his head with the robe’s cowl and only his dark green eyes showed like jade in the shadow. His pale yellow skin, a gift from his forest dryad grandmother, was seen only in small amounts when his hands escaped the folds of the robes to cast his shadow magic, or prepare meals. The two had joined forces nearly two months ago. Almost immediately Markus had got himself into trouble. Karak had already saved him once, from the brutal clutches of four foul Sea Trolls intent on torture and filling their bellies with mage meat. Though perhaps enemies in a different time, the two men had a similar hate now. The Sealord. A creature whose attacks were becoming as common as the clouds around the Dragon Spine’s peaks.