I have always felt shorthanded when it comes to writing fiction and the tiniest of achievements makes me feel good. Around October '08 I had participated in the "Caferati-LiveJournal Flash Fiction Writing Contest" and my story had made it to the top 100 out of 1052 entries. Inspite of frantic voting by friends and family (thank you guys!), I couldn't make it to the final 10. Lately, I have not been updating this blog as often as I would like to. Untill I find something better to put up, here is my entry. Inspirations being Arthur C. Clarke's History Lesson and the Terra Nova Expedition.
The Journal
The objects lay on the table, exactly as the Scout had left them two days ago. The Researcher had delayed analyzing them. The lethargy in him had been well fed by the warmth of his chamber and the excruciatingly slow progress he had been making in the past four months. Every discovery just tangled it ever more.
He had been tracking the movements of his subjects, following a trail of excavated objects that was distinctive to the species. It was known that this particular patch of land had been their last refuge against an increasingly belligerent climate, what he hoped to contribute was the beginnings of this island, how and why had they chanced upon this land mass.
He picked up the fossilized bone first, and tossed it aside with a grunt. It was useless, there were many more he had found, they belonged to a later time. The second was a moss covered object, slightly large, about the size of his palm, the moss on it was patchy. He was doing his routine check of scratching the moss out, something was different this time, a darker more uniform green shone underneath.
He was sure the object had a purpose, unlike most of his finds. It stood on his table, cleaned, it was dark green, and reflected the sunlight. When he put it up against the sun, and it sparkled even more. The Researcher had just managed to get his first smile of the day looking at the green sparkle when he froze. In the next few moments all he could feel were the flies buzzing in his chamber, his heart beating and the dripping of moist air condensing on the glass walls. There was something cylindrical inside it. It moved around as he shook the green object, which he now understood to be just an outer covering.
Excitement mingled with frustration, he banged it on the table, it made a tinkling sound and shattered to pieces, and the kernel dropped to the floor. It seemed organic. The Researcher picked the kernel with his forceps and put it inside the Date Machine. A number popped up. The researcher could hardly believe the figure that showed up. It was possibly the oldest man-made object he had found in these parts. He picked the kernel out from the machine, and inspected it. Its surface had dark smudgy inscriptions, it rolled open to become completely flat and the edges were rough and looked like it fitted into a larger whole. The inscriptions belonged to one of the broad categories that had still not been translated.
The Researcher sighed, those little squiggly marks possibly told a story of the genesis of civilization on this part of Earth, but it also meant another dead end to bang his head against.
He ran his fingers through the marks, it was written,
“Damn you Amundsen”
He looked out of the walls in exasperation at his inability to understand the script.
The sun continued on its incessant circular path an inch above the horizon, its rays cutting across dense fauna.
