Lonely Chatter
This too shall pass.
"This is Tonto. Anyone receiving, over?"
"Tonto, this is Sundance. Good to hear someone else on this freq, over."
"Likewise, Sundance. We're headed to Fort Benning to regroup. You have any news?"
"We're from Benning. The whole place is gone."
"..."
"Tonto?"
"Still here, Sundance. Not the news I was hoping for. Interrogative - do you have medical personnel? We have casualties in a critical condition."
"That's a negative. Callsign Bonnie has a civilian doc, they're twenty k north, but they've been dark for a few days."
"We won't make it that far. You have any other options?"
"Sorry. There's nothing we can do for you. Are you at least in a secure location?"
"Negative. We were hoping to keep moving. Are you? Can we come to you?"
"Negative again. We're bunkered up and buried in rubble. Good luck out there. We had a brief contact with callsign Billy - they say a second wave of bombers are coming. Find somewhere that's still bombproof, over."
"Wait, you can't just - Sundance? Hello?"
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Comments (5 so far!)
Jim Stitzel
I have always admired your ability to write military (science) fiction. Well done, sir. :)
- #2459 Posted 8 years ago
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ElshaHawk LoA
This is a sort of cheat at the whole dialogue thing, but a phone call would be cheating as well. The point is to not rely on description and work it into the piece, which you did. You did it. It counts. But I'm not the judge. :)
- #2470 Posted 8 years ago
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Jae
It certainly paints a bleak picture of the world, even though the reader has no idea what is going on or why, or even who is speaking other than call signs. Especially the matter-of-fact cutoff once it's determined neither group can assist the other.
- #2472 Posted 8 years ago
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rhubarb_j
Very cool HSAR. The lack of description only serves to allow the reader's imagination more scope to fill in the spaces - which I think works really well in your scenario.
This is a really interesting challenge Jim - I hope there are many more entries.
- #2473 Posted 8 years ago
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Story challenge:
Writing exposition is easy. In fact, a common mistake of young writers is the infamous infodump -- writing long paragraphs and pages that do nothing more than provide background and world-building for their story. It's much more difficult -- and much more…
You're All Talk by Jim Stitzel- Published 8 years ago and featured 8 years ago.
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HSAR
I would have preferred a little leeway to use some description - after all, a conversation is more than speech - but I got around that by changing the rules of the game a little!