Action Hero

To write about a hero, an action hero or write a script about an action hero..  I chose the Arab Spring conflicts as a backdrop.
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

He kicked me hard, once more re-arranging me like some baggage loose on the pounding truck bed. Unsupported now, my head bounced constantly on the ridged steel in stabs of searing pain. Cable ties locked my wrists to my ankles and the sharp plastic sawed into my flesh with every crash of the suspension.  I lay in stinking waves of my own piss, bile and blood. As near as I could figure it, from the fading light that seeped into my blindfold, we had been smashing through this rough terrain for a couple of hours.  I had guessed they were dispossessed Tuareg fighters by the veiled faces of the men and the open anger on the clear dark skin of the warrior girl’s face holding the AK47.  She had held it in practiced steady aim at my heart as her partner dragged me roughly out from the back of our car.

We'd thought we had made it too. Fourteen hours driving cautiously through the dessert, bribing or cajoling at roadblocks and avoiding the wrecks of a confused regime change. The Algerian border was half an hour behind us and Emile and François had been singing in the front seat.  We'd rounded another cutting, this time to be confronted with a burnt out tourist bus blocking the passage. Spotting movement behind the wreckage Emile had immediately jammed the car into reverse and tried to swing it around, but a battered Toyota shot out of the gap and blocked his retreat. Immediately we were looking at the wrong end of well used artillery and no escape or excuse was going to work. Francois had been killed as soon as he reached for his weapon, an act of reflex more than intent. Probably reflex on both sides, but Francois, my protector for the last two years was no more. A rough bag had been shoved over my head blinding and stifling me as I was pushed onto the back of the truck and cruelly bound. That was probably about four hours ago and the only words I had ever heard were a brutish, “no talk” followed by what felt like a rifle butt to the back of my head. I was now wishing for the welcome of unconsciousness, which regrettably came to me in only short bursts.
                       ~ / ~
My eyes scratch open and I come around, my world has stopped moving.
I have no idea where I am, what place I have been taken to or why I have been captured.
My bindings have been cut but there is almost no movement in my fingers and I am unable to stand.
I lay on a sand-covered cement floor in a stale room with a barred window and one steel door, alone. 
An aridness beyond description racks my throat.  I can't swallow for the dryness of my tongue.
A dry paste coats my mouth and I am sick to my gut..
And there is no noise. None. Not in the distance or nearby, no wind, no voices, no machinery, no sound other than the heartbeat in my ears and the roar of my breath.
I stop breathing, trying to hear anything. I have never experienced such silence and my breath when I exhale catches painfully in my chest, I am in very poor shape.
An old bulk food can lays propped in the corner and I manage to slide and push myself towards it . There is water, and a pink plastic dish floating in it. I fumble for the dish but pull back not wanting to foul the water with the filth I can see on my hand.
I am sick with thirst. My mind is snapped into clarity by the need to figure a way to save the water and get myself a drink.
Right now there is nothing more important. Bringing the backs of my hands together I grab and dip the relatively clean cloth of my shirting, sufficiently damping it to wipe some of the crud from my hands. This excruciating action brings some life to my fingers.
I can grasp the dish and I take a small cautious sip. It is water, stale but clear water. I take one mouthful and wash it around my mouth slowly allowing it to leak down my dust-filled throat . It may well gag me to drink fast and my ribs could not stand a cough.
The slow, wet ecstasy is all consuming,
I feel the water penetrating parched crevasses and a wave of relief flows through me.
I take another mouthful and luxuriate in the sensation, but I catch myself, cautious to limit my intake as I have so little of this water.

I use my damp shirt to wipe at my wounds a bit more, the activity brings more movement to my fingers but not to my feet. I can however now crawl and move around a bit on my knees. A horse gallops up the wall next to me and I realise I am hallucinating.
I crawl over, take another mouthful of water from my pink cup and lie back...

I am a strategist not a fighter, I am not built for this, all the time I've spent behind the battle lines I have had protectors, guys that could drink lead and shit ammunition. Francois had been the latest in a series of these guys the agency had moved onto me. Over the past two years we had been in some worrying places but Francois had managed to keep me insulated from the immediate dangers, he had won my confidence. The man had a presence that demanded respect and attention, he'd possessed a physique and the sickly charm of a matinee idol,  effective in securing the pleasures he sought.

Emile was of a similar cut and was to be his replacement,  He was scheduled to take over when we reached Algiers. God only knew what had happened to Emile back at the ambush, I had not heard another shot so I could only imagine his fate. 
I had had little time to get to know Emile.  
To be effective he and I would have had to have come to understand each other very well indeed.
Correct decisions have to be made instantly in our world, but like today, decisions may not always be the right ones.
Wrong decisions can be fatal in our line of work.

Emile was a chisel jawed athlete and from what I had seen, and unlike Francois, Emile was a ladies man. He exuded a hungry sexuality. 
Before our departure from Sirt, I had wondered if I could ever completely rely on Emile to stay focused on my safety as his primary role.
I had begun to warm to him during our escape though.
While Francois had shielded and escorted me, Emile proved his abilities, dispatching four guards bare handed and silently to their eternal futures. He had pulled the bent bodywork free from the wheels of our escape vehicle using brute force and I was thinking he was one of that breed of near immortals. 
Strange then. 
It would have taken a lot for the Tuareg to contain him, and I sat considering...
What could have happened to him, 
I had heard no struggle no shouting no shot. I ponder and my own pains surge.

It is deathly quiet here…… .......... .........

Author's note...(This story may continue at a later date….. I think it has some legs…. Emile could rescue the narrator.  I think a really unlikely yet endearing name for the narrator could be Tristram Boddington-Fforbes, it would force him to use a pseudonym, say, my personal favourite Max West, there would be international intrigue, spy scandals, regime influencing, sex stories and victories in battles through the Arab nations, but all the time there will be a growing reliance on Emile,,,,, but with a niggling, uncomfortable, underlying unresolved distrust……)

Components of interconnectedness

The task this week was to let one of the Savage sketcher's works act as muse for a story in a thousand words.

This sketch was chosen and I selected one component of the drawing to build my story around.

Interconnected COMPONENTS

Artemesia looked on as her father scraped the remaining hair from Paquita’s white hide and she secretly wiped away another tear.
Artemesia had been weeping on and off ever since she discovered Paquita laying cold and still when she had gone to milk her. It was hard to accept the absence, she would miss Paquita’s warmth in the mornings, her calm in the evenings. Her goaty friend would no longer stand and listen patiently to her troubles and wonderings as she was milked. It was even tougher to watch on now as dad showed her how Paquita’s passing was to be honoured. She had observed the harvesting of meat they could eat, she had gathered up the hair for yarn that would be made from her last shearing, and as usual, but especially this time Artemesia was a key part of the hide tanning and softening.  So many uses can be had from this fine skin. Yet despite the honour, more tears came.
      ~/~
Stood on the hillside, Montez watched exhausted as his dad grasped the smooth hardwood handle and took grip of the axe, wielding it cleanly into the cleft Montez had chopped behind the face cut. With just four final and mighty strikes his dad felled the massive tree safely away from them and onto level ground. Montez knew how much work was required from this day forward but he was enjoying the work now, knowing he had selected a fine solid tree. This trunk would provide him and his dad much tightly grained timber with which they would make many beautiful things.
     ~/~
Enrique trudged painfully along the village street towards his shop regretting a night spent on the blanco tequila in Garibaldi plaza. Working in his little abattoir may earn him a living but it wasn’t a good one. Today at least he would be doing light work, although to be honest, separating offal for its different uses was not the most pleasant of jobs.  As if any job in his line of work were pleasant.  Enrique’s morning-after stomach crawled at the thought of stripping and cleaning the stench from bowel sections but he did have customers for the gut and his brother always wanted some of the best lengths..
    ~/~
Akiro became more and more pleased as he thumbed through the text on his blackberry. This Keith fellow sounded like he had played a bit and from what he was saying, it looked like he knew his stuff. Last weekend at Whitelocks, Peggy and Andrew had agreed to invite him in and hopefully the new guy would fit to their style. Akiro was determined to prove his parents wrong about his life choice, as strange as they thought it was.
    ~/~
It had been almost eight weeks now but Artemesia had kept track of which hide was Paquita’s and today she made sure she was the one who removed it from it’s tanning frame. It may not really have been the case but she was sure Paquita’s calm beauty still shone from this skin that she now rinsed and caressed. The hide certainly had benefited from the care Artemesia had lavished on it. Smooth, even and flexible it was almost transparent and would be a high priced sample for the buyers at the village market. Artemasia intended to hold out for as many pesos as she could to honour her goat friend’s spirit.

Montez was shaping some chair legs in the sunshine as she walked past his shop and she smiled at him when he caught her eye. ‘Beautiful day for a beautiful senorita” he grinned.
Artemesia blushed slightly but stopped to look at his work. “you make lovely things”
“I thank you pretty lady, but this beauty is already in the wood, I just let it come out”.
She looked up from the items he had crafted and Montez was staring at her.
She felt the heat rise in her face again.
“What is that you have there?” he asked.
“It is Paquita’s hide, I am wanting to sell it today” she said as she held it closer to her chest.
“May I see it? If it is better than your best I may be able to save you the walk to market!”. Reluctantly Artemasia released her hold and allowed Montez to assess her handiwork.
“Oh, senorita,” smiled Montez, “This is a very fine hide. May I buy it from you?”
“Make sure he gives you a good price!” Called out Enrique from inside the doorway “he tries to pay cheap for my stuff so you make sure you drive a hard bargain senorita”.
    ~/~
Akiro and Peggy were the first to arrive at the lock-up and having rolled the door up started sweeping out the usual grot and rodent droppings before opening the boxes and setting up the amp and mics. Andrew strolled in about ten minutes later and immediately plugged in his base to run off the new riff he’d been working up. They discussed some chords and Peggy layered some viola plucks and notes over it.  Akiro tried a melody and the riff slowly gained shape.  Keith stood watching unobserved for a moment from the door. He had not considered that a Japanese guy would be a rasta-man, that had made him pause rather than walk straight in as he normally would have. Anyway it gave him the chance to see how tight they sounded and he was pleased the bass player was delivering a crisp edge that the music needed.
“Hi” called the viola player once she'd spotted him standing there.
“You must be Keith” Akiro said, “Come in, glad you could make it”.  Introductions were exchanged and as Andrew shook his hand he eyed the conga drum.
“Can I have a look at your quinto” he asked. “Where did you get it?” and they fell to discussing makers and skins until Akiro and Peggy chipped in and the afternoon rolled away into a bit of jamming and a few beers.
At around nine that night the three original members were laying around in Peg’s flat. Andrew, getting up for another can said “Well, I reckon the bloke’s going to fit in okay”.
“I loved the drum, Andy.” said Peggy, ‘it sounds so beautiful.”
“Yeah, it’s some shit Mexican make, never heard of it, but that skin was magic wasn’t it? And a good gut binding, body hand carved. Buggered how they do it for the price.”
“Yeah, all good." Interrupted akiro, "But if he does come and join us on Saturday we’re going to have to set up a stand for him, he doesn’t know our stuff”.
“That’ll be okay Akiro-san, Andy can lead him along for a while.”
“Yeah, I’ll stand behind him, we’ll work it out, no probs.” ......