It’s been a really long time since I’ve been tagged for anything. So recently, I was tagged by Lina for this particular challenge. Thanks, Lina! I appreciate you thinking of me after you found out that I write stories and how you appreciate my ideology of incorporating several characters of various ethnic groups. You all should check out her blog if you like anime and manga. Also, this tag was created by Keiko of Keiko’s Anime Blog.
Here are the rules:
1. You pick your “word”, your setting and your story genre from the list below.
As individuals, your brand of creativity is unique to yours, so we want to highlight that by letting you choose from a bunch of words and creating something beautiful out of it. Yes, some people will choose the same combination as others but I guarantee you each story will be unique as per the individual. The options are really just there to cater to you specifically. You can challenge yourself, you can work with your strengths or you can take creative risks. It’s all up to you and how you express your creativity.
2. The short story will have a limit of 1000 words. You do not need to write a story with 1000 words exactly. It could be 300, or 500 as long as it doesn’t surpass a thousand.
3. YOU HAVE TWO WEEKS TO ANSWER THE TAG. This is honestly just another way to ensure none of you overthink this. It’s not supposed to be your magnum opus. It’s just a fun short story to share to people. If you cannot answer within two weeks, the tagger can tag other people.
4. Lastly, you must tag three people to participate. Keiko will collect all the short stories and compile them into one giant hub featuring all the stories.
5. Don’t forget to link back to Keiko (link back to this post) so she can collect all the stories. You can’t just link back to her wordpress, since she won’t be alerted of the pingback. You need to link back to a post or a page, because wordpress works like this. (Very important guys!)
6. Use the Create-A-Story picture in the post. I don’t really know why, but a lot of tags do this so might as well, right? But seriously, it’ll mostly help people recognize all the Create-A-Story tag posts.
7. Copy and paste the rules in your tag post as well, so others can be clued in to the Create-A-Story rules.
Alright. Here’s my story “Rebuilding Solace”. My words will be, Rain, Mountain, and Tragedy.
***
“Rain will wash the impurities away.”
Those words ran through my mind as I became busy setting up one of the last bricks on top of the building. I wiped my brow as the midday sun beat down on me like a sledgehammer. The air became thinner as I was at the building’s apex on this mountainous terrain. I knew there was more work to be done.
“Aren’t you Malachi Tariku?”
That was a woman who called out from the base of my project. She wore all white and she had her hair in intricate crown braids.
“Yes, I am. I assume you’re Semhar Ilan then.” I replied. “You’re the one who’s in charge of the last major project in our community, I assume.”
“You’d be right.” Semhar sternly answered. “I’m surprised you and your crew have been able to fix everything quicker than gazelles.”
Normally, I would’ve found her comment to be patronizing, but I couldn’t blame her for talking in that way. Then again, someone like her had to be serious given how grave her position was around here and what she was in charge of.
The memories flooded in as to how the village became that way. We were secluded from most other communities across the mountain. It was on one of the steeper hills and the altitude could make anyone dizzy if they weren’t used to the overall climate. We were a peculiar people busy doing our own things. We harvested our own food, made our own clothes, built our own houses, worshiped together, and even made the most elaborate pieces of art.
We had no enemies, and we had good relationships with the other nearby villages.
However, Rebsana (our village) would change in the blink of an eye.
“Malachi, aren’t you going to come down from that building?” Semhar called out again.
“Of course. Just give me a couple of minutes.” I descended from the roof, went down the hatch, and I finally went to the door. Semhar crossed her arms. “What’s your problem? There are worse things to worry about than me taking extra time to make it down safely.”
She just huffed and we walked towards where her workspace would be. The dust and heat certainly made things more intense. I was proud of the newer architecture around here even though we were understaffed although no one could blame us for working with a skeleton crew.
“You are certainly skilled, but I believe you aren’t taking this massive undertaking seriously.” Semhar noted.
“Okay, I’m not going to stand for that.” I argued. “You saw me finish that building and I worked on getting those houses back in order. Just because I’m not overdoing it with my emotions doesn’t mean that I’m apathetic.”
“Fine then, Malachi.” She said. “You’ll be far from apathetic once we get to my domain.”
Rebsana, you will be refined after what happened.
I couldn’t block out the memories, and no other Rebsanian could ever do that. The quiet prosperity filled us with contentment and happiness for centuries, but we were now on reserves in restoring the glory that once bestowed on the village. First came the insults of our people being called poor excuses for wanderers. Then came the actions afterward. Stupid Azomians…
We walked on over to the giant field in the valley of one of our mountains down the slope. My jaw dropped when I saw a sea of plots. One man just put down his shovel.
“Ms. Semhar, they’re all accounted for.”
I saw a mix of tears and sweat cover this grown man’s face. I couldn’t fault him for feeling that way.
Semhar walked up and hugged him. “Thank you very much. You’ve done well.”
I saw the list of names around this field and I could remember them all. Friends, family, young and old. I was on duty with fixing this area earlier.
The pain kept subsiding.
Those Azomians caught wind of us having cobalt, silver, and gold. The other communities in the mountains had their own deposits, but they were plundered. It’s as if all the Azomians were parasites taking whatever.
What they left behind wasn’t good at all.
I prayed that the divine would restore what was devoured in Rebsana. What we did was a start by rebuilding so many homes, schools, businesses and the local Bet Maqdas for all of us to worship.
“Many rains have hit us, but they were torrents of fire. It will take a long time for the purification to take fruit.” I commented.
I remembered holding my fallen compatriots as I did everything I could to protect my people from our invaders when that brutal time happened.
Semhar prayed as that project was done.
“You will never be forgotten.”
That field was filled with the graves of half our community afflicted by the Azomians. Men, women, and children’s souls would by sky-bound. Near that memorial was a giant wall with cannons every ten feet from each other that was newly built.
I will never let that rain hit our precious Rebsana ever again.
***
I now hereby tag the following people…
Angela Grant: You’re a brave blogger for your posts and I’m glad we had intelligent conversations about serious topics. I know you have the talent to write a powerful short story or microfiction.
Elle: You’re a talented writer and I like your various short stories. Feel free to give this a try!
Scott: What’s good, Scott? I know you’re good at writing articles about anime and reviews of that medium, so I thought I would give you this little challenge.
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