Poker face card #4: Future tense

[katrisims]

This was a very hard one for me. First to figure out what to write about with such a vague prompt (and my last remaining one is "1000 words or less", oh man...), then to actually do it. Future tense isn't very natural to me, it seems, and in fact I had to allow for a couple of present tense verbs that refer to the future to avoid blatant overuse of "will". (Actually, there is still a blatant overuse of it, and it doesn't feel entirely fluent to me.) I could have written much longer about this conversation, but I had to leave out things that would necessarily have been in the wrong tense.

Anyway, what do you do when you need to write about the future but don't want to spoil it for the audience? You just go far enough in the past. So this one is canon Alphabetia, from the times of generation A, when the founders were still alive.


Prompt: Future tense
Title: The dark future
Words: 216
Universe: Canon Alphabetia, during generation A
Warnings: none

"Enough about the past, Author. I will now speak to you about the future. There will come a time, when Salahuddin Chamcha is very dangerous to this family. He will do whatever it takes to be with you."

"I will be dead, and so will Count Curtis, Sunny."

"That will not stop him, not this man. Based on his behavior in your son's wedding and even before that, he will be willing to go very far indeed to gain you back. He will not resign to it being impossible."

"But whatever will he do, to me being dead?"

"Bring you back, or attempt to. He will find ways for it, and he will use them. Whatever his means, bringing you back will be a very dangerous thing to do. Not only to you and your family, but to all of Alphabetia. Naturally, he will not understand this, but go forth for his own benefit. With his determined, stubborn character and his obsession with you, he will not take any dangers into consideration. He will not care about the future or the safety of this universe, to him the only thing that matters will be you."

A long silence between them.

"If that should ever be the case, will you help me and my family?"

"I will."

Comments

[mzyra.livejournal.com]

Wow, this is a pretty hard one to do, isn't it? Good job working with it though! :)

[katrisims.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it was surprisingly hard even. *nodnod* The result still feels slightly awkward - but it's in future tense as was asked! :P

Thanks: :)

[katmiesterk8.livejournal.com]

Future tense? Glad it's you who had to do it and not me! Good job! :)

[katrisims.livejournal.com]

Heh, yeah, it was pretty hard to do actually, and the result is still a little awkward in places at least. But I got it done! \o/

Thank you! :)