Mental Game

Okay, this is my very first ever poem. It was written for my Creative writing class, and we were required to use certain words like "Lackadaisical" and "Unerring." I'd actually appreciate feedback on this, as I'm really going to fall on my face with the first half of this class if I don't figure out this poetry thing quickly.

Opponents face one another without delay

quickly saluted niceties start the commotion.

Moving like dancers the players move and sway

lackadaisical lunges invite hasty locomotion,

false attacks elicit flustered parries that betray

a players introspective skill.

One final touche to finish this action,

one has to react when the other goes in for the kill,

stress eviscerating both minds with rancor and frustration.

A shrill cry signals an unerring strike

one player overwhelmed, one sighs with elation

she’d expertly lashed out where he didn’t like

completing the mental game against a poor man called “Mike”


A few specific questions: Does it flow? Does it make sense? Etc.

Jonathan

In his life, he was a farmer, and his name was Jonathan. He lived in the country with his wife and three daughters. They didn't have much money, and the taxes on their land were raised every crop season since the new King took the throne.

Every year was the same. They plant wheat, corn, and various types of squash. The crops bloomed in waves, corn was the first to grow. Jonathan and his two oldest daughters tend to the current crops, picking the ready stock and loading the carts to go to market once a week. Jonathans wife Mary, and their youngest daughter Julie were most comfortable with the cows and chickens.

This year was the most pathetic year for any of the goods they could take to market. A family of foxes settled in the forest around their land, taking out the bulk of their chickens including the one breeding rooster they owned. The crops suffered from drought, which starved the cows as well as the stock of fresh vegetables for market.

"I don't know what we'll do! We'll lose our land, our family, our rights all in one fell swoop..." Jonathan trails off, waiting for the comforting words of his loving wife.

"We'll figure it out, Jon. We've done it before."

"This is different. This new King...he cut the old bloodline and took over by force! Do you really think he's going to show mercy for us? We can't even provide them with anything to eat."

Mary assured him that things would be alright, and insisted she take the girls to town to sell their goods to needing townsfolk. Jonathan was hesitant to allow a woman to take his place, but he relented after a bit of convincing from Mary. She had a plan.

The following day Mary and the girls secured the slim amounts of corn, eggs, and milk in the cart, fastened the mules harness and reigns and headed off after a kiss each from Jonathan. "I love you," he said to her. She simply nodded and smiled, whipping the mules to start moving.

In town, the effects of the drought were felt by all. Townsfolk nearly mobbed the cart when the gates opened. Several town guards had to fend off the starving people, several arrests were made. Seeing her opportunity while the guards were away, Mary set up the cart near the entrance with all three girls sitting in plain sight for sympathy bargaining.

"Settle down! Settle!" Mary shouted, "With the difficulties of this year, we recognize your plight! We're willing to negotiate our prices." She set up a sign over the edge of the cart, it read:

3 eggs - 50Gold
2 korn - 100Gold
1 bred - 100Gold

The small remaining crowd growled at her sign, cries of "ludicrous!" and "Who does she think she is? What woman can do this?" After several minutes of busied shouting, the guards returned with a scowl. "What's goin' on here?" They demanded in unison.
"Why, I'm just selling my goods. No crime here," Mary responded, covering the sign when her body as best she could.

"What are these complaints? Where's your husband?" They demanded again.

"My husband is sick, I'm taking care of things for the family today," she shrugged.

The guards weren't buying it. They shoved her aside to get a better look at her cart. "Hey! What's the meaning of -" she cries.

"What is this? These prices are outrageous! How can you charge your own people this?" The guards shouted, grabbing her and her daughters. "No woman should be working like this, and we're gonna make you pay." The guards carted them away, screaming while biting and clawing at the guards armor.

"Leave my girls alone! What kind of monsters are you? Where are you taking us?" Mary demanded, barely taking a breath between angry statements.

"Ah, Fighters we got here, Bill," a short fat guard chuckled.

"Let 'em. She'll be screamin' somethin' different by morning," the taller guard, Bill responded.

Something of a malicious chortle came from the short fat guard. Mary twisted her body and kicked at the guards in desperation. She may have made a mistake.

A lot of things around the house had to be repaired, so Jonathan made himself busy at home while he had the opportunity. He started by fixing the door to the chicken coup, which had been chewed through by the family of hungry foxes. Next on the list was hanging a pair of ropes with a plank of wood in the large Oak tree near the house to make a swing for the girls.

"Thanks fer savin' us the trouble, farm boy," a loud voice came from several yards behind Jonathan.

"Exc-excuse me? Who're you?" Jonathan stutters, squinting against the sun to see a large blonde man in full shining armor with a red cloak draped behind him.

"Commanda' Richmond," he bellows, "But don't bother introducing yourself, Jonathan. Wimp of a man sendin' his women to market for him."

"Uh - W-what? What's going on? Why are you here?" Jonathan stutters as he nervously scans the men surrounding Richmond.

"Your bitches were in town, rippin' off the good people that live there. You bumpkins think you can do anything. We'll see," he smirks, turning to the men to his left. "Burn it."

"What?! WHY?!" Jonathan cries out, backing away from the remaining guards.

Richmond just shook his head. "You simple farm folk sure are stupid. Allow me to explain," Richmond paces in front of his remaining men, "Your woman and babies. They were in town trying to dupe the townsfolk. The King doesn't take kindly to things like that."

He stops, turning to face Jonathan. He lowers his head, but raises his eyes to meet Jonathans, "They squealed. Especially that little one. We shot 'em. Well, we raped 'em first." Some of the men grinned and adjusted themselves at that confession.

"You. You. You fucking slime. You piece of shit! I'll get you, you'll pa-" His voice chokes off as he's clubbed in the back of the head by a guard that snuck around the house.

When he came around, Jonathans head was throbbing with the new lump he was given. His hands were bound, and he had an old rag in his mouth as a gag. "Yek ee o!" He choked through the rag. He could taste the piss when he breathed in.

Richmond just chuckled, "What was that? Let you go? And why would we do that? A hanging is good for morale. It's damned funny, too." The guards around him laughed in unison, eager to see Jonathan twitch.

Jonathan leaned his head back, recognizing the rope he'd just tied for his daughters swing now tied loosely around his neck. His throat tightened, and he began to choke on his own vomit. Tears streamed down his face as Richmond ordered one of his men to kick the barrel out from under him.

It didn't take long before Jonathan stopped kicking. "Damn. With all that puke in his throat, he didn't even struggle for long. What a waste." Richmond shrugs, "Burn him, too," Richmond ordered before returning to his horse.

Something happened that night that no one could explain. The farm itself was void of life after the guards stole whatever food they could find, and burned the rest. The thick smoke reeked of the carcasses burned in the barn and chicken coop - but the body that should have been hanging from the tree was gone.

Instead, a new figure roamed the ground under the tree as though he were looking for something among the wreckage. The only thing visible on the figure came from the center of his chest - a red stone shone in the limited moonlight peeking through the clouds and smoke.

As the smoke cleared in the early hours of the morning, his armor became visible in the moonlight. But it didn't shine at all. Instead, it was dull and covered in heavy scratches. He had mismatched pauldrons on his shoulders, and dents all over the arms and legs. The dagger at his side was dull and rusted, his shield cracked, but his sword was immaculate.

On the blade there was a line of glowing red runes down the middle until about 6 inches before the tip. This section of the blade was abruptly wider by 2 inches, which led to a sharpened curved tip. For close-quarters, the hilt of this blade covered the owners armored fist in a row of heavy bronze spikes.

The owner of this beautiful sword and armor enchanted by the red stone was actually not human. Instead, his bleach bone skull protruded from the high collar of his armor. Every weak spot on his skeletal body covered, save for his skull. If you asked the maker of this armor why they chose this design, they'd tell you it was to instill fear deep in the wearers enemies. And they were right.

The figure wandered around the old Oak tree for hours, kicking aside bits of debris under the burned remains of the rope hanging from the lowest branch. "Ah ha," the figure uttered in a hollow voice, bending down to pick up something from the ash. He brushes it off to examine it, revealing a golden wedding band.

His armor is slender enough that the ring fit perfectly on his left ring finger. After adorning the ring, the figure directed his gaze toward the city. "Mary, your man will make them pay for our daughters and the life they'll never live," his voice echoes very distant, but it certainly belongs to the quiet farmer, Jonathan. He attaches the leather straps from his shield to his arm, unsheathes his sword, and marches toward the town.

By dawn he can see the gates in front of him. The guards stationed on either side of the gate on the battlements watch as Jonathan approaches. "You there. Sheathe that sword if you wish to gain access," a tall guard warns, raising his armed crossbow. Jonathan continues his march undeterred.

"What is it you seek, traveler? Our Inn is closed, our town is poor," a short fat guard shouts from atop the battlements. Jonathan keeps walking.

"Halt!" the tall guard announces once before letting a bolt fly at Jonathans armor. The armor harmlessly deflects the screaming bolt without interrupting its wearers forward march. "Er - Bill, did you even hit him? What're you doing? Give me that!" The short guard grabs the crossbow from Bill after a new bolt has been loaded. The short guard fires a shot that hits ineffectively on the heavy armor.

Before either guard can load another bolt, Jonathan presses his left palm against the gate and begins to push. "That ain't gonna work, you stupi -" Bills eyes widen and he cuts off his own words. "Hey Bill, what is that? Is he wearin' someone's skull as a helmet or what?" Bill can't bring himself to shout at Jonathan again. Instead, he runs as fast as his shaking legs will carry him.

"Oi! Bill, get back here!" The short man shouts after the fleeing Bill. The fat guard looks back at Jonathan still pressing against the gate. The wood brace on the opposite side moans and cracks, sending small splinters flying. The fat guard shudders at the awful sound, and turns around on his heel running back toward the guard tower to warn others.

Another loud crack sounds, waking the entire town. The brace for the front gate nearly explodes with dry wooden splinters decorating the shops closest to the gate. "See, you guys think I'm nuts sure - but look at that!" Bill shouts back at a handful of groggy reinforcements. "What was that? You said one guy! One guy couldn't do -"

The gate explodes open and the guards fall silent. Jonathan stands in the middle of the doorway without backup or reinforcements. A few of the sleepy guards chuckle "Nice one Bill, you nutter. We're off," a blonde guard stretches as he walks away. "No, wai-" Bill begins, before his chest is pierced by the inhumanely fast armored skeleton.

The guards stare in awe after Jonathan cleared 20 yards or more between the gate and their position in a matter of seconds. "Shit," one of the guards utters. He begins to draw his sword, but catches the curved blade with his throat before he can even remove it. Jonathan goes through the handful of guards within 5 minutes.

A woman who watched the slaughter from a nearby window lets out a scream before fainting. Jonathan turns toward the source of the sound and catches sight of the cart his family owned sitting by the gate. "Maaaryyyyyy!" His hollow voice echoes through the town. He collapses to his knees, slamming his fist into the ground. The closest buildings shake with the force, and it doesn't take long for more spectators to show their faces through slightly open windows to see what was going on.

"Where's Richmond!?" He bellows. Half of the windows close, while several remain slightly cracked but without audible response. Guards start pouring out of the towers on either side of the town. They saw Jonathan slaughter their comrades in a group, so they decide take a different approach. "Surround him!" a tall guard with a heavy mask with an everlasting scowl etched on it orders, "Don't let him out of your sight! On your guard, men!"

Jonathan decides that this group will be made example of. The first were dispatched too quickly, these guards think they have an advantage. Jonathan begins to walk toward the guards on his right, sword drawn.

A few guards shift their weight and look around nervously, but the masked guard in charge doesn't budge. "The farm girls your town took from me, they were my family. You took my family, I will remove you from yours!" Jonathan shouts at the guard directly in front of him, who drops his sword and runs toward the fortress in the center of town.

Jonathan lets the next guard draw his sword and take a swing. His cracked shield takes the blow before the sword punches a hole in the guards face. He removes the sword violently, spraying two surrounding guards with its victims blood. The two guards decide to rush him in the hopes of catching him off guard. It doesn't work.

Jonathan parries one blade with his own, and ducks under a wide swing from a clearly amateur guard. The young guard hits his partner with the wide swing, burring his sword deep in the guards neck. "No!" the young guard shouts before Jonathans blade sneaks around his shield through the guards chest armor.

The remaining guards turn to run toward the fortress. Jonathan manages to dispatch three more before they get away. He lets the fleeing guards escape, of course, to make sure the fortress is thoroughly disturbed by the time he arrives.
All of the remaining guards, including Richmond, stand on the battlements of the keep.

"This didn't work last time, what makes you think it will now?" Jonathan shouts up to the nervous guards stationed along the wall.

"This!" Richmond growls back, raising his bow. Every other guard on the wall does the same.

"On my word. Ready? Aim!" Richmond almost smirks, "LOOSE!" The guards let arrows fly down at Jonathan. He raises his shield to cover his exposed skull, and begins laughing low. Once the whistling of the arrows stop, Jonathan roars with hollow laughter.

Several guards lose control of their bodies in response.

"Shall I burn it?" Jonathan shouts to Richmond, "That would be your solution, no?"
Richmond shifts his massive weight and armor. "Bring the oil!" Richmond shouts to the guards standing in their own piss.

A large barrel of oil is hoisted above the gate where Jonathan begins to press. "Dump it. NOW!" Richmond orders, "And light those arrows, fools!" A heavy stream of black oil covers Jonathans armor, dripping down the front of the gate, and pooling up on the stone around him. Still he pushes on the gate.

A groan and a crack from the wooden brace signals more arrows to fly at Jonathan, setting the oil on and around him ablaze. The flames crawl up the wooden gate quickly. The gate crumbles under the heat, collapsing over its aggressor before it reaches the guards standing on the battlements. The guards closest to the gate let out a long sigh of relief after holding their breath for a time.

Each guard is hesitant to claim victory, so Richmond encourages them. It is, after all, good for morale. "Yea! We've won! Don't you see? We always win!" Richmond shouts, pumping his fist above his head. The guards are still relatively quiet, but a few join in on the celebration. This celebration however, is short lived. The pile of burned rubble on the ground shifted off of the armored skeleton effortlessly.

Jonathan doesn't say anything to the guards, just begins slowly walking forward through the gate into a wide open room with one wide set of stairs in the center. Large draperies in red cover the walls. Long tables line the walls under the draperies, and several statues stand through the room celebrating the King that sits on her throne.

Jonathan raises his sword to the statue, pointing it directly at its chest. "You, too," Jonathan's hollow voice echoes low.

He makes his way up the stairs to the second floor. A few guards went inside in an attempt to turn the narrow hallways into an advantageous fighting position. The guards from one side close in, boxing Jonathan between two stone walls and two rows of guards on either side of him.

"Gotcha," the scowling masked guard proclaims.

"You do? It looks to me as though you too, are stuck."

The guards didn't even catch Jonathans movement as he impales the masked guard. He's done taking his time. He skewers the second guard in front of him with the masked guards body still attached to his sword, ignoring the two behind him. The flanking guards take the opportunity and run toward the stairs while they can.
After kicking the guards off his sword, Jonathan decides to block the door instead of entering it. He moves a large stone slab in front of the door, and makes his way toward the other entrance to the battlements. As he throws open the door, several of the guards try to run through the blocked door.

"It won't budge!"

"Get outta the way, weakling! I got this!"

"Shit! What are we gonna do?"

One of the guards is decapitated by a single swing of Jonathans blade. The next guard in line down the battlement wall grabbed the edge and vaulted himself over the edge. Too bad for him, the ground wasn't far enough to kill him. Both of his legs snap with a sickening crunch when he hits the stone below. He screams in pain, writhing to escape the pain in his lower body.

"What'd we ever do to you?!"

"Why are you doing this?"

"What are you? Why is this happening?"

Confused angry shouts filled the air. Jonathan just kept marching forward. A few more guards tried their luck at vaulting over the edge, all suffering similar broken bodied fates. The rest were impaled or dismembered if they held their ground. A few guards fainted and were trampled to death, and one brave guard tried to sneak up behind Jonathan. His head was crushed by the cracked shield swung sideways at him.
Richmond was out of options. He was cornered, and out of men.

"Please, I'm beggin' you! I didn't mean it! I'm sorry!" He pleas, falling to one knee and dropping his sword to his side.

"I told you, I'd get you," Jonathan said. Richmond's eyes grew wide as the sword came down on the crown of his skull, nicely dividing his face in half.

Jonathan flicked his blade to one side, dispelling the blood from its smooth metal surface. He turned around and headed back into the fortress. "King Seigmond! You don't deserve this throne! You stole it. Gave power to Richmond and his men. I'm taking it back!" Jonathans shout echoed through the halls. His calls were answered only by desperate slamming sounds against a particularly large, ornate set of doors. No doubt Seigmond was reinforcing his position.

Jonathan didn't bother opening the door, he simply thrust his sword forward through the wood into something soft. "Urgk," was all that sounded through the doors. When Jonathan retrieved his blade, the body slapped hard against the stone floor. "It's mine, now," he reassured the corpse of the former King.

With a single kick Jonathan forced the doors open, grabbing the body of the King by his white night robe. He dragged the body down the stairs, and tossed it into the still smoldering pile of rubble and writhing broken guards in front of the Fortress gates. The current kings followers picked up what they could carry, and fled to the forest surrounding the town.

To his surprise, however, the native townsfolk began to roar with applause at the disposal of their tyrannical king. Cheers from all were heard loud and clear. Jonathan was confused. They actually wanted him, a brutal skeleton, to rule over them. Then, he remembered announcing who he was for all the town to hear earlier in the day.

Many of these townsfolk knew him as Jonathan, the simple farmer married to Mary with three beautiful girls. They traded with him. They trusted him.

"Jonathan, when we heard about Mary we wanted to help. Richmonds forces and followers were too well armed compared to us. They took everything. Food, weapons, whatever they wanted. We want to help you now. Please let us." A man with braided hair and beard pleaded for the crowd. Everyone nodded eagerly, and Jonathan had to make a decision.

"I can not lead you. I'm not real. I don't know how long this lasts. I didn't even know what this old armor was, just that no one would buy it in such a battered condition. I'm sorry," Jonathans voice echoed in his armor. The crowd lost its energy and began to despair. The braided man stepped forward again.

"Then who will lead us?" He inquires.

"You could."

The man nearly choked on laughter, "Me? Me?! I'm a fisherman. I'm no leader."

"And I was a farmer. What's your name?"

"Frank," the man replied.

"Well then, Frank. I will lead your army for however long this armors enchantment lasts. The rest is up to you." Jonathan dropped to one knee with a loud clatter. It wasn't long before the rest of the town followed suit, bowing to their new King.
"At least I didn't kill that King in his nice clothes," Jonathan almost laughed. "Let's get this place cleaned up. It smells like piss." Frank stood speechless for several minutes before commanding people to various tasks.

The townspeople were as happy to help as they said they were. Several men boarded the town gate, and cleaned up the large bits of debris - including bodies. Groups of men and women worked together to hunt and fish. Several children carried buckets of water from the stream to the fortress to wash away the taint on the battlements.

Jonathan and Frank walked around the town, discussing ways to improve the lives of the townspeople. It may or may not last forever, but for now at least he could use this enchantment to help people that needed it.