12 April 2013

SFFS: Terribly Wrong (another FALLEN snippet)

Two weeks in a row? I think it's starting to become a pattern again...time again for reading your weekly dose of Science Fiction Fantasy Saturday posts, everyone. Once again, we're watching Aston's latest excursion in Fallen. Aston's just faced the natives of the planet for the first time, and now Life has been a bit down in the dumps lately. When we last saw Aston, he had a disintegrator cannon in hand and was ready to meet his new visitors. So, thanks in advance for all of your comments, and be sure to go visit all of the other writers through the link above.

Gazing around the area, my selections for the demonstration were limited, but I narrowed it down to the closest tree, sitting alone in the sand. Unsure of how it would fare against a disintegrator cannon, since I’d only used it against living, breathing targets before, I fired off a single shot at the top.

The broad, green leaves atop the tree all burst into flames, falling toward the ground. Unlike my past targets, the tree burned straight down its trunk, leaving only a collapsing remnant of ash until only a stump was left, barely sticking out of the ground.

I stood there, even finding myself impressed with the display. Chuckling under my breath, I turned back to face the natives. Figuring they’d followed their friend, so I could get off this planet, I was dismayed to find that not only had they not fled, but that they’d dropped to their knees.

Perhaps this would be harder to do after all.

And then they uttered some sort of obnoxious incantation, and at the same time, began bowing down to the ground and up again, before repeating the process over and over again.

Something had just gone terribly wrong.

Now don't everyone act surprised at that last line...

While you're waiting for next week's snippet, be sure to check out my other novels and novellas.Or even better, buy a copy of all my books (and those of folks I know) from Amazon through the promotion board to the right...

14 comments:

  1. HAHAHA! Phenomenal. It would appear that Aston has added "deity" to his resume, no? :-D

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  2. LOL Instant deification! All right, Aston!

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  3. Poor Aston, indeed...when he's not fearing for his life, he's being worshipped...heh. :-)

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  4. Got to be careful how you make those demonstrations of power. And who knows -- maybe the tree was their former deity?

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  5. One never knows, when they're dealing with people they haven't come across before. That's why the prime directive was so important with the folks in Star Trek. ;-)

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  6. I love the image of burning tree. Definitely awe-inspiring enough to warrant worship.

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  7. If you've never seen a disintegrator cannon before, it would definitely be!

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  8. Uh oh! He's destroyed their sacred tree and now they now before him in supplicant manner because they fear he's a terrible demon! Poor Aston...can't ever catch a break. Had me chuckling here!

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  9. Considering how it seems the natives had not been exposed to anyone like Aston, I'm not sure how he wouldn't have considered that the display would be quite literally awe-inspiring. It'll be interesting to see how he deals with it!

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  10. Great visuals of the tree! Awesome.

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  11. Aston used his boom stick to make tree go bye bye - now the question is do they see him as benevolent or evil deity. Great stuff.

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  12. Loved the description of the tree disintegrating.Excellent stuff.

    Oh, poor Aston! They think he's a god! He's never going to get off the planet now!

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  13. I'd think if there was a doubt of benevolent or evil, I'd still do whatever they said...given the demonstration. ;-)

    Ol' Aston always seems to get himself into the worst messes. Hopefully this one ends up better than the rest (though I wouldn't count on it).

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