So, while I was visiting my home, I was going through some old papers of mine, ranging from drawings to school report cards. Interestingly enough, I had no qualms getting rid of the report cards, certificates of achievement, and other things of that nature, but when it came to my crappy little drawings, I couldn't let go.
Well, one of the things I found in this pile of stuff was a printed manuscript of my very first attempt at a novel. Yes, well before I was actually publishing books, I was trying to make the great American novel. Truth be told, I actually remember (vaguely) writing this, sitting at my dad's computer, type-typing away at some blue-screened, DOS-based word editing program.
And I was nine at the time. I want to stress that before you read any more.
Well, I was so tickled by finding this that I decided to share it all with you. In the next four posts, I will be showing off my creation in its completion (which is to say, its nowhere-near-completion).
Marvel at my use of surnames like "Mrufoon"!
Laugh as I use jokes ripped, word-for-word, from The Simpsons!
Gasp at how minor characters literally throw themselves at certain death!
Cry at the fact that my main character's personalities are as fickle as a quark!
Now, I wanted to keep this as true to source material as possible. Meaning, it reads as though it were a terrible fan fiction. So, instead of transcribing the piece (which would have been painful in and of itself), I scanned it using Adobe's text-reading features. It's not perfect, but I tried to iron the mistakes. Unless, of course, the mistakes were supposed to be there. In which case, you can just imagine a giant "[sic]" at the end of each of these posts.
Remember, I was nine. Don't judge me.
And now, if you can keep from ripping out your eyes, enjoy!
The Day
By: Andrew D. Schnorr
On the rainy night of March 26,1979, a police officer had a strange feeling that something very bad was going to happen at the museum he was in. Something very bad did happen. And it happened without warning.
All of a sudden a red cloth the size of a human in the shape of a tube appeared out of nowhere. It turned into a man wearing a red cape, but he was not a superhero. He wore black, tight-fitting clothes (with the exception of his cape).He had razor sharp teeth. Half of his hair was shaped like spikes and the other half had a buzz cut. He had black and orange stripes painted across his face and his eyes glowed red. All the policemen stared at him in amazement, wonder, and horror. They all thought their heart had stopped beating, or skyrocketed to an extremely high beat. No earthy thing could have done that. And no earthly person could want that hairstyle.
"Time to grab the goodies,” he said in a regular human voice. Then he started breaking the glass cases, stealing small diamonds, and putting them into a large, leather bag. In not very long he had every diamond except for one and it was the biggest one. He looked very pleased that none of the policemen did not attack him but he did not look surprised. Just when he was about to break the glass case of the diamond the museum doors swung open and a bunch of policemen came running in. Two of them that were around 21 came in before the rest of them. When they almost got to him he threw two small leather bags on the floor. They quickly expanded into one big sand pile. Two huge hands made out of sand came out! It grabbed the two policemen, took them under the sand, and the sand shrunk and disappeared.
"I'm going to kill you!" A much older man yelled. He had a mad look on his face.
"Kill me? I...don’t...think...so. You don't know who you’re dealing with. I am Mocknock, lord of all Econick. And you cannot defeat me." so said the man with the wild hairdo.
"OK Mr .Mocknock, the man who thinks he is so hot, C 'mon. Try me. I dare ya." the man said.
"Very well." Mocknock said. Something appeared out of nowhere; It looked like a titanium tube that was one foot long and two feet in diameter. It had a handle on one end and an opening on the other end. Inside the opening it was pitch black-"You chose your fate."
"And I chose it well!" the man yelled. He reached for his gun and was about to fire, but before he could Mocknock pushed a button on the handle of the thing and it sucked the gun inside of it!
"I see you are interested in my Suck-0-Matic," Mocknock said over the rumble of the vacuum-type tube. Then the man felt his feet move, but he was not moving them. He was being sucked into the Suck-0-Matic!
The man ran to the bathroom and shut the door behind him when he got inside, He locked the door and thought that he was safe, but then the door started rumbling, and popped out of its sockets! It flew into the Suck-0-Matic, and even though it was too big to get inside of it, it still went in and disappeared! The man stood in amazement for after the door disappeared the Suck-0-Matic devoured a seven foot tall lamp! And might I remind you the Suck-0-Matic tube was only one foot long!
But the man was not standing still anymore-He was being sucked up the Suck-0-Matic again! He held onto the doorframe to keep from getting sucked up. He held on as tight as he could. His shoes got sucked right off his feet! Then his socks, and then his ...
"All right! All right ! I give up. You have proven me wrong,” Mocknock said. The man calmed down. He let go of the doorframe. He still could not believe that he had beat this thing.
"Well.. ." he started to say, but before he could finish his sentence he heard only one single word.
"NOT!!!" Mocknock said. He quickly pushed the button on the handle of the Suck-0-Matic before the man could do anything about it. He was sucked into the Suck-0-Matic! Inside, it was like a slide that went nowhere.
"Ahhhhhhhhhh!!!" the man screamed as he slid down the long slide. That was why everything that went into it disappeared. But the man did not worry about that now. He had his own problems.
"Well that is taken care of. I might as well finish the job,” Mocknock said. He squeezed the Suck-0-Matic so hard it began to shrink & shrink & shrink. Before long it had vanished. Then Mocknock headed for the big diamond again. But one policeman tried to stop him.
"Oh, no you don’t!” the policeman said as he jumped on Mocknock's back holding on by putting his arms around Mocknock's neck.
"Oh, yes I do ! " Mocknock said. Then he started changing in a way that no one could imagine. It looked like there was fire inside of him and that it was coming out of him. In a short while of time he looked like one big statue of hot coal.
"YEEOW!!!” the policeman yelled as he jumped off Mocknock's back. Mocknock headed for the case. He put his hand on the glass, and it went right through! Wherever he put his hand it melted the glass! He cooled off his body before he grabbed the diamond so it would not melt.
After Mocknock took the diamond he walked toward the wall. He grabbed both sides of his cape. A policeman ran at him, ready to ram Mocknock into the wall.
"Sorry, but I'm in a hurry." Mocknock said. He took his cape, whirled it around him, turned into the red tube of cloth, and disappeared. Instead of the policeman ramming Mocknock into the wall, he slammed into it himself.
The only thing that Mocknock did not know was that the two 21 year old cops that were dragged under the magic sand both had younger siblings. But they were not brothers themselves. And the older policeman who was sucked into the Suck-0-Matic was a father. The one policeman who jumped on Mocknock's back while he was becoming very hot knew what he had to do. He told 10 year old John Mrufoon, the son of the policeman who got sucked into the Suck-0-Matic, about his father's fate. He also told a 9 year old girl, Cindy Flaco, a sister of one of the 21 year old cops, about her brother's fate. And last but not least, a fairly dark skinned boy, 16 year old Zack Lecon, the brother of the other 21 year old, was told about his brother's fate.
All three of the kids had something in common. They were all going to have the biggest adventure they ever had.
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1 comment:
Ah, I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who remembers DOS. By what you described, it sounds like you were a WordStar user. However, Microsoft Word 6.0 had an option in which you could use a blue background with white font on the display. If your dad had Windows 3.0, 3.1 or 3.11 (Windows for Work Groups), it may have been that program.
It actually isn't too bad of a read, given the context that you wrote in when you were nine...Maybe you can tweak it up a bit in the future if you run out of ideas for novels.
-Comrade Chavez
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