Re: To End With a Leap (NWC) [comments are appreciated]

11:59pm May 5th from where I live.

Character count: 24993. Why too much

“A slight shift in weight was all that is needed. Lean just a forward, and let gravity do the rest. Don’t stop it. Don’t fight it. Let nature take care of itself. It won’t even be that bad, with the rush of air and cool misty on your skin. It will feel like flying through a cloud. Best yet, you’d blackout before you hit. No pain then. No more pain ever.”

These were the thoughts of the man that stood on the edge of the waterfall, which gushed its white froth from the river behind him, through the canopy of trees below, only to connect with a grand crown of rocks that stuck out of a reservoir beneath the trees.

Around him, the sounds of the forests where louder then they have ever before: the pidgy’s chirps were deafening, the combee’s wings buzzed with a force so great that you could feel it in your chest, and the rattata were the loudest as they pounded across the grass, which shattered like glass with every step. It wasn’t only just what he heard that was amplified today. The colors of the trees where more vibrant than any artist could ever attempt to mimic. The smell of the flowers and trees could intoxicate him into a never waking slumber. The gentle breath of the forest rush past his neck, giving him goose bumps. He could taste the very life all around him in the air.

These, though, would not, could not, change his mind. He was going to end it today. All the painful memories, the regret, and the longing to be with her would all be over soon. It was now or never. One step in either direction meant death for him, and he preferred the quicker path.

“I’m coming Rachel.” Taking one last breath, he closed his eyes and everything stopped. The sounds died to a mummer, the colors dulled to almost a grey, the smells became an ether, the forest stopped its breathing and life turned to death in the air. Exhaling, he opened his eyes, learned forward, and let nature take care of the rest.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

*Thud*

“…Ohhh…my head...What the..?” Tom grunted as he struggled to get out of the net his sheets had created around him when he fell out of his bed. Once free of the linen trap, Tom crawled back on top of the ancient bed and propped himself up against the wall, which doubled as a head board for the simple bedding. Reaching over it his left, Tom grabbed a dark brown bottle and a small crystal glass, filled the glass half full of the strong smelling liquid that mimicked the color of the bottle it came from, and shot back every last drop on his throat in one swig. Cringing his face a bit, Tom shook his head as the numbing set in, pulled his hands slowly down his face, scratching over the untrimmed scruffs of a beard, and then refilled the glass for another round of masochist torture.

After finishing off the bottle, Tom set the glass down and put the bottle next to a dozen other empty ones that littered the left side his bed. Like a sloth, he moved with slow, exaggerated movements as he removed himself from his bed turned distillery as the extra spirits in him too their toll. Today was a special day, though, and thus needed to be celebrated with in a spirit of intoxication. Today was his birthday. Today was also the day the bank came to take his pathetic excuse for a house away. Today was also the day his daughter died.

As he slugged over to the living room, which was only a step and a half out of his bed room door, he slumped into his moth eaten, puke green, cloth chair. This chair, decades ago, was once a very nice, warm chair with a lovely color and design along the sides. Time, though, ate away the design, faded the color, and Tom sucked any nice, warm feelings out of the chair long ago.

Looking over to the answering machine on the coffee table next to the chair, Tom saw a dim, flashing light, telling him that someone had left a message for him. He reached over and pressed the play button, which then gave a single, dull beep. Then the sound of a man came drowning out of the little machine. It was a whining, nasally voice, that spoke with and air of arrogance and conceit. It was a man Tom know well and also had borrowed a lot of money off of a year ago: Zat, the local loan shark, who always sounded as if he was choking on his own double chins as they weighed down and closed off his wind pipe. Zat said, “Tom, you know damn right who this is. You are a hard man to get a hold of, but you know you can’t hid from me anymore.” The voice stopped from a few seconds, replaced with the sound of Zat trying to catch his breath. Zat was a huge, disgustingly fat man that always talked until he was out of air, just so he could stop and make you listen his obnoxious breathing. Once the horrible sound stopped, Zat continued, “If I do my math right, and I always do, then I figure that you owe me the initial 100,000, plus an interest rate of 10% a month for late fees, plus a service fee for making me come and hunt you down like this.” After taking another ghastly breath, Zat finished by saying, “Adding everything together, and rounding up for simplicity’s sake, I see it as you owing 130,000 in all. Now, I know that you won’t try and run out on me with my money, will you Tom? If you do, you might find yourself in some very bad situations, and trust me, you will have some very bad situations, the likes of which you couldn’t even dream up of. Now, I will be coming by tomorrow, and you better have my money. Have a nice day Tom, and,” adding a smug snicker at the end, “pleasure doing business with you.”

With a final beep, the message was over. Tom knew that this day was coming eventually, but he couldn’t believe what the message had said. “130,000...” Tom let the words fester in his mouth a little before washing them out with a swig of spirit from a newly opened bottle. He didn’t even have 30,000 to his name, let alone 130,000. “He’s really going to kill me this time,” muttered Tom out loud. Taking the answer machine in his hand, Tom snarled as he lifted it up, and chucked it across the room where it shattered across the wall and fell into a dozen little pieces onto the floor.

As it hit the wall, though, Tom accidentally threw it up again the lone picture frame on the bleak wall, cracking the glass and knocking the frame onto the floor. Sobering in an instant, Tom ran over to the wall and dropped to his knees in broken plastic and glass to pick up the cracked picture frame, franticly scanning over it to make sure the picture itself was unharmed. Seeing that the picture itself was safe, Tom let out a long sigh, picked himself up off the ground, which was already pooling a little with blood from his cut up knees, and limped back to his chair with the picture in hand.

The picture was a simple one, taken with a disposable camera. In it, there was a nice, bright, white house, a descent, red car in the driveway, and a little girl standing next to a brand new Acro Bike. The girl had a soft, angelic face with long, straight, brown hair blowing slightly in the wind. She had on a paper birthday hat and had a smile from ear to ear. It looked like it was her birthday and she had just got the bike. It was such as happy moment, forever captured, frozen in time.

A small tear fell on the picture from up above. “Rachel…” Tom gently laid the picture down next to him where the answer machine once was. After sobbing for a few minutes and finishing off a bit more of the bottle, Tom slowly glazed over his house, taking in everything around him, which wasn’t much. Over the past year, after losing his job, Tom had sold most of his possessions so that he could have the money for his best friends: Captain Morgan, Jack Daniel, and Mr. Jim Beam. The only real things Tom had to his name anymore where his poor excuse for a bed, the puke green chair, and the now destroyed answering machine. “I wonder what Rachel would think,” Tom thought to himself. He felt so empty inside, as if every emotion, even sadness, where being sucked up into the void in his soul. Thinking back to what Zat had said about his dreams, Tom began to think of his own.

This wasn’t the first time he had had that dream. In fact, it was the only dream he had had for the past year that had slowly became more and more dark, mimicking his own life. Zat had said he would create a very bad situations for Tom, the likes of which he couldn’t even dream up of. Zat knew nothing of what Tom could dream up. Zat could never match what Tom had to see every single night and remember every single day. Anything Zat threw at him would be a relief from what Tom had to suffer through on a daily basis.

Hell, why fight it? Tom finished off his current bottle when he began to think seriously about his dream for the first time ever. “It’s a sign. It has to be.” Tom began to pull the shards of glass out of his knees, but felt no pain. There wasn’t a bit of feeling left in him at all anymore. “Rachel is calling out to me. She want me to be with her…and I can join her too.”

Tom frozen in place as life, for the first time in a year, made sense; if he was to finally be rid of all this emptiness, he must take his dream seriously and join Rachel. Tom fell back in his chair as he soaked in this realization. Death was just around the corner with Zat, so why not just get it over with now? Taking one final glance over his house, Tom lifted himself out of his chair, walked over to his closet, and pulled out his nicest clothing. Today was his birthday. Today was now going to be his death date, too.


_____________________________________________________________________________________

The chirps of the pidgy and the buzz of the Beedrill could be heard from the clearing Tom had used as his resting stop. He had been hiking most of the morning and was about half way up the side of the mountain that over looked his home town. After putting on a nice red dress shirt, a pair of black dress pants, and a small, black belt, Tom had left his house and his life behind, bringing only the picture of Rachel with him.
Picking himself up, Tom turned towards the top of the mountain, up towards that cursed waterfall, and started his exodus up the slope.

Tom knew this area very well. He had grown up in the area and had lived in the town below for most of his life. In his youth, he had explored every peak and valley this mountain had. Even as an adult, he used to occasionally come up here with Rachel, who loved to explore everything around her from the day she was old enough to crawl. It was her love for exploring that lead Tom to buying her that Acro Bike. And it was her love of exploring that lead her to that waterfall: Crown Falls.

Tom had always warned Rachel about those falls. He told her all the ghost stories of how bad kids got swept up by the river and carried over the edge. He chuckled darkly to himself at the thought about how he had joked around with her about being carried over. He thought he had done everything right as a father. With his wife dieing as she gave birth to Rachel, Tom had done everything he could to keep his only child safe, but he still had to work to support the two of them and couldn’t always be around to watch over her. After she got her new bike, she would disappear for hours in the mountains, now able to get in a whole new mess trouble for her father to worry about.

Then, one year ago on his birthday, Rachel ran up to her father as he was getting ready to go to work. She shouted out, “Guess what, guess what, guess what?!”

As his daughter bounced with excitement, Tom playfully asked, “What is it, hon? Did you find another caterpie?” She was always bring back things from the mountains, and Pokemon where not excluded from her list.

“No daddy, you know I don’t like bugs anymore. No, this is sooo much better! Can you guess what it is?” She looked up at his from under the newspaper he was trying to finish before he had to leave.

“Um…let me see…well, can you tell me what it looks like?” Tom looked at his watch: it was ten ’til. He had to leave real soon.

“Well, ok then. It’s big, it a really pretty blue, and it is really, really loud. Can you guess?”

“Well hon, I just don’t know. Why don’t you tell me?” Tom had finished the paper and was now tying his shoes.

“I can’t do that daddy. It’s a surprise for you! Today is your birthday and I want to surprise you with what I found!”

Walking to the door, Tom turned around and said, “Ok hon, I’ll look at it after work. If I don’t get going, though, I’ll be late, and then daddy will get in trouble. Now you be good and play nice with the neighbors. Oh, and please don’t go deep into the mountains today. That last storm we had made a big mess up there and I don’t want you getting hurt. I love you and I’ll see you around six.”

“I love you too daddy! I’ll be right here when you get back!” And Tom closed the door behind him.

Around 5 p.m. Tom got a call from the police station and was told to please get there as soon as he could. Tom left work and when he got to the police station, the sheriff, Henry Guilder, who had been one of Tom’s close friends growing up, walked him into a back room and told Tom he best sit down.

“What’s the matter Henry? Why did you call me out of work? What happen? Did something happen to the house? Did Rachel get into some kind of trouble? No one is telling me anything.”

Henry, at first, wouldn’t look Tom in the eyes. Finally, he turned to face his old friend. “Tom,” he said, his voice almost breaking, “It’s about Rachel. There has been….an accident.”

Tom, who had chose not to sit, stumbled back into the chair now. “What happened Henry. Where is Rachel?” But Tom already knew what he was going to say. He saw it in Henry’s eyes.

“We think she was playing up around Crown Falls. This last storm knocked down a lot of debris into the river and gave it a nasty undertow. We think that she had dropped something in the water and tried to go get it back, but the undertow sucked her in and the debris kept her from reaching the banks.” Henry paused for a second, small tears forming in his eyes. “Tom, she went over the edge and hit Crown Rock below. A couple at the reservoir saw her fall. I’m sorry, Tom, but she’s gone.”

The funeral was held shortly after, closed casket of course. Rachel L. Cast, January 12, 1999 to May 5, 2009. This was the simple line Tom read as he stood alone in the cemetery. He had to burry the last bit of his family and his only child next to his wife. “This isn’t suppose to happen!” Tom yelled out at the funeral, angry sobs ringing out over the cemetery. “Fathers aren’t suppose to bury their children next to their wife. Why…..Why?!”

Tom continuously thought over and over,“ I left her all alone, all by herself. She even told me what she was going to do. She was going to see the big, blue, loud thing in the mountains. What else could it have been?” These things were the only things on his mind day and night, not including the fact that he kept having the same nightmare about the waterfall every night. Finally, Tom found the bottle helped soothed away the guilt and depression and that, with enough of it, numbed everything else…

Tom was brought back from his day dreaming as he stumbled over a blue rock in the middle of the path. Catching himself at the last minute, Tom steadied himself and was about to walk off when a loud whine came from behind him. “Sheeeelll!!!!! Shellos!” Turning around , Tom saw that the blue rock had turned its head around and was wailing out at him. It then occurred to him that this was, in fact, an Eastern Shellos. Tom couldn’t believe that he had completely missed the Pokemon and had actually tripped over it. Tom was never a trainer, but his favorite Pokemon was always the Eastern Shellos. From their calm, cool, blue skin, to their soft, green undersides, Eastern Shellos were perfect at every level, as far as Tom was concerned.

“What are you doing here in the middle of the woods?” said Tom as he walked back the little Pokemon. It was common to see exotic Pokemon in these mountains from trainers abandoning their pokemon or from the occasional swarm coming through, but Shellos where almost never far from a river or lake of some kind. Then, Tom saw it; the Shellos’s back end was covered in scratches from either a Staravia’s or a Staraptor’s talons, meaning this Shellos was the dinner that got away.

After making sure the scratches weren’t serious, Tom took out a bit of granola he had with him and offered it up to the Shellos. “Here you go. I won’t be needing this anymore.” Putting the pile on the ground, the Shellos quickly jumped at the food, eating every last bite. While to tore into the granola, Tom saw that it had what looked to be a collar made out of ribbon around its neck. Tom looked around for its owner, but he neither saw nor heard anyone nearby. “I guess your alone on this mountain too. Just like me.” Reaching down, to get a better look at the collar, Tom saw that the ribbon was tattered and weather worn. In some places, it only held on by a few threads. Down at the bottom of the collar, around the Shellos underside, their was a nametag. Or, at least, Tom thought it was a nametag. It was really just a bit of bark with a small hole at the top for the ribbon to slide through. The bit of wood was covered in dry mud, but Tom could see a bit the lettering. In poorly carved out letters, the name, “TOD” stood out.

“Well, I guess you’re called Tod.” The Shellos, looking up from its finished meal, smiled and let out a loud call. It seemed happy with the name. Looking up at the sky, Tom saw that he only had a few hours of daylight left, and he wanted to be with Rachel before the day was over. Turning back around to the Shellos, Tom said, “Ok little guy, if you want to find a nice lake to swim in, just go down this path and go left and you’ll find a big reservoir. I’ll be joining you soon if you get there fast enough.”

As Tom turned around and began to walk away, he heard small scuffs across the ground. Looking back, he saw Tod following close behind. “Come on, shoo. You don’t want to go where I’m going. You’d best find someone else to follow. One person over a waterfall a day is plenty enough, thank you.” Walking away, the sounds of Tod’s soft belly scuttling across the ground once again filled the air. Tom had heard that once a Pokemon had befriended a human, it would always want to be around humans. He guessed that no matter what he said, the little Shellos would follow him, even if it was all the way to the top of the waterfall.

“Well, I would really like if you would please just leave me be, but since you won’t, just promise to not follow me until the end.” Starting back up the trail, Tom looked up at his future, now visible and only an hour’s walk away. “Off we go. Here I come Rachel, just wait a little bit longer for daddy.”

_____________________________________________________________________________________

The sun was setting in the west, and a soft red light covered everything in sight. The trees took on an amber tone as the grass looked like pure gold. All of nature transformed from a wild, wooden place by day to a royal palace of precious gems and gold by night. Everything glittered in the waning sunlight, except for the torrent the formed near the edge of the falls. Here, what would be a river of rubies turned to a foaming brim of blood as the water churned and roared angrily at all that dare look upon its face. And, as if this river of gore what not enough, a recent storm had thrown debris and extra water into the river, which now threatened to breach its banks. All this added up to a frightening scene of fast moving branches spinning and bobbing in the water, which looked more like the bones of some giant beast and the river was the gallons of blood it split.

Here was where Tom and Tod stood. Tom was on the brink of his reunion. For the first time in a long time, Tom felt feeling in his chest, but not what he expected. He imagined he would be frightened, or anxious, or maybe even joyful. No, what Tom felt was that this all seemed anticlimactic. “Was this really it?” he asked himself. He felt like there was more that was suppose to happen, as if one more thing was needed to occur before he could finish his quest. But there was nothing else. He had nothing else. What was he suppose to do?

“Shell!” cried out Tod, as he looked over the churning vortex in front of them. He began to back away in fright.

“Don’t worry, little guy, this is my path and not yours. Now, let me be and go on to the reservoir below.” Tom took a deep breath and began to walk up to the lead of the falls. “A slight shift in weight is all that is needed. Lean just a forward, and let gravity do the rest. Don’t stop it. Don’t fight it. Let nature take care of itself.” Tom kept repeating the line from his dreams over and over again as he neared the edge of the falls.

Reaching the edge, Tom looked over and down below. “This is what Rachel saw before she when over, and now this will be the last thing I see.” Taking another deep breath, Tom thought the sounds of the forests where louder then they had ever before: the pidgy’s chirps were deafening, the combee’s wings buzzed with a force so great that he could feel it in his chest, and the rattata were the loudest, as they pounded across the grass, which shattered like glass with every step. Just like his dream. Even the colors of the trees where more vibrant today to the point that no artist could ever attempt to mimic these colors. Just like his dream. The smell of the flowers and trees could intoxicate him into a never waking slumber and the gentle breath of the forest rush past his neck, giving him goose bumps. Just like his dream. He could even taste the very life all around him in the air. Just as if he was in his dream.

This was all a sign from Rachel. She was telling him that now was the time to come and be with her. Exhaling, all the magic around him dulled, and he started to lean forward.

Suddenly, he felt a strong tug and he was yanked backwards onto the ground. Spinning around in anger, he saw Tod with a bit of shirt still in his mouth. Spitting it out, the Shellos barked out, “Shellos! Shell, shell, Shellos!”

“Why you little…! How dare you stop me from going to my Rachel!”

Tod puffed out a little and then, turning to the ground, hurled a mud slap at Tom’s face. After covering Tom in filth, Tom lost it. Picking up the shellos by the collar, Tom walked back along the river a few yards and was going to set the shellos down when the ribbon broke. Tod fell to the ground and landed upside down, not hurting it, but now it couldn’t get back up. “I’m sorry, but you had that coming. Now, let me be.”

As he walked back to the edge, Tom looked down at the broken collar in his hands. It really was a miracle that the ribbon hadn’t broke off sooner than it did. It looked like that Shellos had dragged the collar through the entire mountains. Then Tom looked at the mud encrusted nametag. He suddenly realized that what he thought were the letters T O D to spell Tod were actually only part of what was carved on the nametag. Taking his finger along side of the tag, Tom scratched off the rest of the dirt. What he found underneath nearly dropped him to his knees. Carved in the side of the little strip of bark was the message, “TO DADDY FROM RACHEL.”

*Splash* Tom spun around to see the Shellos, no, Rachel’s Shellos in the water, desperately trying to get out of the debris and back on shore. The Shellos must have turned itself back over and was trying to get back its precious treasure that Tom had took: the only thing left from its trainer. “It’s big, it a really pretty blue, and it is really, really loud.” Rachel wasn’t talking about the falls. She was talking about her first pokemon. Now, Tom had sent his daughter’s Shellos to its grave. The undertow was too strong and there was too much debris in the water. Tod would never get out before the falls.

With no time to think, Tom jumped in after Tod. Wrapping his arms around the little blue Pokemon, Tom tried to make it back to the banks, but the undertow was just too strong. He and Tom where barreling towards the edge. “I guess this is…” but what ever Tom was going to say was drowned out by the sounds of the falls. In a blind of an eye, Tom and Tod where over the edge and free falling in space.

Holding on tight to Tod, Tom suddenly felt a release deep down inside him. It wasn’t that life was over, or that he would be dead soon. No, it was that he felt like he was finally with Rachel again, through Tod. Tod was always looking for its trainer, Rachel, and had held on to the one and only thing that Rachel had given it. This was a symbol of Rachel’s love, and through Tod, Tom felt her love. “I love you Rachel. I can move on now.” And with that, Tom and Tod disappeared into the white mist that rose up from Crown Rock.

 

claim for grading

 

Spoiler

Intro:

Way to hook someone in from the beginning. A suicidal man and his dream caught my attention, and most likely anyone who came to read a simple Pokemon story.

You brought us into the mind of Tom well with his actions and reactions to the broker.

Plot:

I must say this: Aaaaaaawwwwwwweeeee...

At first it seemed like Pokemon were just thrown into a story you made before, but as I read on, I realised that it was essential. There's this thing: I don't remember what its called now, but its when the reader can predict what is going to happen, but doesn't care and wants to see it happen. This happened to me. Once I heard "It’s big, it a really pretty blue, and it is really, really loud", I knew it was the Shellos and it was later confirmed with the nametag TOD, but still I had to keep reading. You even surprised me with the whole name being just the note Rachel left Tom... Must say this plot is really original.

Grammar:

There were some tense confusion:

In all of these phrases, you should be using the past tense, since you've been using the past tense in the same paragraph/refering to the past.

Watch out for little things like this.

You mistake "were" for "where" on a few occasions.

Also, remember to double space and make new paragraphs so the reader can read your story easier. Also you should make a new paragraph when a new character does and action/speaks. You didn't do it much but here is one example:

When Zat starts to talk, there should be a new paragraph.

Oh and last thing: Pokemon species are capitalized. You did capitalize Beedrill once and Shellos a few times, yet most of the time you used lower case.

Details:
You had a lot of detail. Most of it was very useful in painting the picture of your story, especcially in the dream and refering to the dream. It helped the whole mood of the story between the despair of the father to the highness of the dream.

Battle:

There was a little scuffle, but no battle. However, the befriending and realization of Tom was a great substitute. I'm glad that you knew that there didn't need to be any battle in a story.

Personal Feelings:
The only problem I had with the story was this:

Since this would be taking place in a Pokemon world, I don't think they'd have the same names as real world Brands. Since the Pokemon world is loosely based on Japan, using brands from there would be more believable. Though, must best suggestion for this would be Pokemon Puns or references to people in the anime/game, as this would liven up the serious mood and give the reader time to not be all serious for a bit.

But on the whole, I loved it.

Verdict

Spoiler

Spoiler

Here is you're prize:


I know you don't really catch it, but if it were up to me, Tom and Tod would survive. Thank you for a great story.