Context
Write a story within 1000 words by using a mix of 6 different prompts under each category—character, setting, and conflict, selected using an online random number generator tool.
Story
✍️ Character: An old man
✍️ Setting: In the woods
✍️ Conflict: Ate a poisoned berry
It is a rather eerie afternoon in the middle of the woods, where a century-old cottage stands surrounded by dense teak plantations that are much older than the cottage itself. To the west, about half a mile away, trickles a babbling brook. Its sound can be heard near the cottage due to the bizarre silence the forest bears. Not a single sound of another being, as if the animals, birds, insects, and rodents have shunned the forest.
Hush! Did you hear that?
I hear—hastening footsteps, crushing dried leaves on the ground.
A man, about 70, struggles to catch his breath. He looks pale, with dirt all over his face and tattered blue flannel shirt. It seems, he’s injured his right arm. He can hardly move it from his shoulder. Sweat beads trickle down his forehead. He looks at the cottage with his tired, bloodshot eyes and a smile appears on his face. It must be his cottage. He holds on to a tree trunk for a beat and takes another step ahead, only to stumble on a rock.
“Watch out!” I cry.
He doesn’t hear me and falls face down.
“Are you okay?” I ask, wanting to help him, but I can’t. I am only the invisible voice, who is witnessing this for the first time… with you. The only difference is that—I am in the story.
I hear something rustling again. Look! He’s awake.
He struggles to pull himself up, knocks himself against the trunk, and falls on his knees.
That must hurt.
He bends to brush the dirt off his knees. A scarlet droplet makes its way to the ground and falls on his muddy old sneakers, followed by another, and another. His nose looks wet. Before I say anything that he can’t hear, he touches it and realizes that he is bleeding profusely.
He sits on the ground, resting his back against the tree with his legs stretched out, and looks up, pinching his nose to stop the bleeding.
I don’t think that will help.
Wait. He’s tearing his flannel shirt.
Good thinking.
He stuffs his nostrils with some of the torn fabric and continues looking up.
He’s dozing off. Is it safe? Should he sleep now?
“Wait! Stay up, will you!” my cries go unheard, and his eyelids slowly close, looking at the canopies that, at this moment, start spinning in a circle, like a whirlwind, and he and I get sucked into it.
“Aaaaahhhh! What’s happening?” I yell frantically.
The old man is floating around me in his torn, muddy clothes, with blood-soaked fabric balls stuffed in his nostrils, eyes half closed with just the sclera, the white of his eyes, visible. Quiet. Unconscious; till we’re thrown into another green patch.
I fall on my right arm. Crack—I hear it go, before a loud thud. Moaning, I turn to lay on my back holding my injured shoulder and twist my neck to where the sound came from. It’s the old man again. Thrown to the ground, wailing in pain now.
I prop myself up against a tree.
Should I be injured? I’m formless, after all. Is he dead, the old man?
As I walk closer to him, he tilts his head. With the white of his eyes fixed on me, he points at a tree.
I chill runs down my spine. Can he see me now? This can’t be real—only, it is.
I look at the tree. It’s a Jwala Bor tree, a rare berry found only in the jungles of Nanditata. We are surrounded by hundreds of these trees.
The best part—it’s medicinal. I pluck some and sink my teeth in its juicy red flesh. I want to give some to the old man too. I hold one near his mouth. He doesn’t move a muscle. I squish some berries in my hand, open his mouth, and squeeze the juice in it. His reflexes kick in and he gulps down a few drops.
This won’t be enough. So, I look for a flat boulder, collect enough berries, pick a stone, and start squishing them, but they just roll away.
I gather them and try again. They roll away again.
I gather the berries for the third time, hold them under the palm of my injured arm, and raise the stone with the other, aiming to get them all this time.
The berries refuse to stay and the stone lands on my fingers, puncturing the flesh, sending signals of sharp pain to my brain. Tiny streams of blood flow on the boulder now.
To my horror, these streams expand, engulfing the old man and me. I suddenly feel light, and my body is raised.
“Where’s the old man?” I look around in the scarlet torrent and locate him, but he drifts away from me before sinking in a swirling red eddy.
I swim toward him, almost hold his hand, but get pulled into the bloodstream.
My brain is numb. Heartbeat quiet. I can’t hold myself up anymore. The pungent stream burns my eyes. I close them for a bit but FLASH! A bright light shines on me.
I hear muffled sounds of people talking, and open my eyes, still unable to register what’s happening.
“We have him!” shouts someone.
‘Sir, are you alright? Can you hear me?” It’s a man in scrubs, wearing gloves and a surgical mask.
They put me on a stretcher and start taking me somewhere. As I drift in and out of oblivion, I see a group of forest officers sealing the cottage—my cottage—and the way to the Jwala Bor plantation.
“What happened?” I whisper to the guy in scrubs as I pull his hand.
“The berry plantations are…” I hear this clearly. The next few words possibly were, “poisoned by the contaminated water,” and I drift into deep sleep again, probably never to wake up.
Priyadarshika I 