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A Tale of an Old Fashioned: Windup Tiger in a Box

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eagoy's Avatar eagoy
Level 56 : Grandmaster Lava Rider
295
My week late entry for the:
Weekly Writing Challenge: Week #1

by: PersonWhoPlaysMinecraft




Prologue


In the corner of a shop window, the music box was open and far from its cousins. They were completely discolored in the eternal light. "Hmph, they get that from those spoiled music boxes" growled through his voice with a tad of jealousy. He just stood there in a forgotten corner. Far from passing people like its own maker.

His younger cousins had the most beautiful movable dancers, croaking ducks with sound, ballrooms full of glitter and knight tournaments of old. This lonely music box had to make do with a tiger. A tiger who was mistaken for a fox more often than he would have liked. A tiger with single footing- tail movement mechanism and changing backgrounds. No dancers floating across the floor to the beat of the music, no knight swung from his horse under loud trumpet blasts. Oh the music box was immersed in self-pity of its own inferiority.

Outside in the freezing cold, a heavy snowstorm raged, in which was a street kid. His hollow eyes looking for shelter. Over there! at that one shop there was still a place under a roof. Once she arrived she looked into the store. The eyes widened in amazement at the wonderful world inside. Music boxes full of moving dancers, knights and more. However, she could not see it moving well by other people in well-dressed clothes. These would give her rather a kick back into the snowstorm than give her a good viewing position.
Her eyes suddenly fell on a music box that was clearly visible from her place. A fox, no a tiger? Stood still in the box. Unfortunately it had no magic winding system with which it started to play and play again afterwards. The shop assistant looked out the window and sighed. What a crowd of people in front of the store, but none of those who would buy anything inside. In the corner of his eye he suddenly noticed that a street kid was staring at the single lonely music box. The shop assistant walked over and wound it up. Slowly the music box came to life, the box hadn't played in years.

The eyes of the street kid looked at the shop assistant suspiciously. He kindly pointed her at the box as he walked away after he wound it up. The street kid began to watch and fantasize about what the tiger experienced in his mysterious journeys

The music box was startled out of his self-pity. The two background rollers moved creaking and out of time. The tiger started to move, slowly the tail started to whip and walk. The music box looked out now that his mechanism had started and saw a spectator. No, not a person with money that would buy him and take it to a world further. But it was public. Even if it were his last appearance, he would run that tiger to its bitter end, even if it fell apart from rusty misery.

The story of the tiger

The tiger emerged from its petrified position, the tail moving irregularly slowly. The tail started to move more and more regularly, just like his walking movement.

Looking around a white base flat with some greenery alive ahead. While walking he ended up in the green hunting fields. Looking around was all grassy plain. In the distance some trees that provided shade from the bright sun, the sun shone as it can only shine in summer.

Inadvertently, the street kid got a little warmer when thinking about the sun.
A Tale of an Old Fashioned: Windup Tiger in a Box

Scanning the fields, the tiger could find no prey, no broken twig or scent marks, but only his own rumbling stomach to warn prey. A rumbling stomach that luckily did not grunt as loudly as the street kids tummy. As if the music box that noticed, the tiger continued to track. The sun had left and dark clouds began to appear.

The street kid noticed that the wind had turned and the clothes were slowly getting wet from the melting snow on her. As if the tiger were connected to her, the dark clouds slowly began to spit some rain. Small drops that you could ignore that quickly grew into thick drops that penetrated your clothes. The tiger was getting desperate, no prey in sight, rain that his already rusty coat could not tolerate. But what were those shaped pools? Footsteps? The tiger's eyes began to shine, as if a dull jewel had been polished and displayed in a beautifully lit display case. Following the tracks, the tiger came to the edge of the green field. Before him started the mountains and a cave entrance as dark as a moonless night. Once entered the cave, the tiger shook out his rusty fur.

As if the street kid was a tiger cub, she also shook off the water. To the disapproving looks of the fellow storm shelter people. They noted that she was completely absorbed in that old dilapidated music box, which could not make a sound and only some movements.

Once the eyes of the tiger got used to the darkness of the cave. He noted that the wet footprints went further into the cave. Continuing through the cave - past stony spines that slowly descended from the ceiling, past dull earthy metals that people seemed to find fancy - the tiger came to a halt. The ears were pointed and rotating slowly to better perceive the soft sound. No footsteps, but deep growls or roars. The tiger was not afraid, add the rumbling stomach to it and you get a deadly creature that will devour every prey to the bone.

A Tale of an Old Fashioned: Windup Tiger in a Box

While creeping, the tiger went on and on. To the point that the bottom of the cave stopped, not a path forward, but an abyss with roaring water from a river. The tiger let out a howl, no prey to devour, no meal to satisfy his hunger. Perceiving through the darkness, the tiger found a bridge. Once across the bridge, the tiger felt a warm stream of air, like a hair dryer emits from a distance.

A Tale of an Old Fashioned: Windup Tiger in a Box

Following the warm air stream further, it slowly grew lighter in the cave. Subtle but clearly lighter and warmer at the same time. After walking for several minutes through the cave, another river emerged inside a deep abyss. No, not a river of roaring water, but of smoldering lava that flowed faster than the tiger could run. The heat was scorching, such that marshmallows would burn directly 10m away from a campfire – no mercy for the unlucky. Tracking the edge of the river, the tiger found a crossing path. A winding stone path across the glowing river. After a few nerve-racking moments, the tiger had passed the lava river.



Finding a path to follow, the tiger continued further into the cave. As the tiger went further down the path, it became darker, quieter, and odorless... An uneasy feeling crept over the tiger, something was not right here. The feeling became more and more oppressive. Eventually the tiger came out in a room, a room with a staring eye on the wall. The starry sky was visible in the floor with a separate border. Strange that starry sky, which is normally only reflected by water, but the ceiling shows no stars. Not being able to restrain curiosity, the tiger licked the starry sky. No water tasted the tongue, but a poignant ability that the tiger wants to drag into the starry sky. A terrible force that devoured the tiger completely.

The tiger came to its positive, but the body was feeling petrified and saw a white area with green ...
Déjà vu? Before the tiger could follow that thought trail further, the tiger completely stopped.



Epilogue

Moaning with a satisfied undertone, the music box stopped playing. The end was reached without broken parts and the audience was still watching. Looking around, he saw his peers staring at him, they no longer had an audience. The sun had started to shine and all the audience had left. But that street kid had continued to look wide-eyed. The kid blinked several times and came out of his fantasy world.
The street kid disappeared, but the good mood of the music box did not. Audience that stayed until the end was a rarity, even the others rarely make that happen. The feeling of satisfaction grew less and less over time until the music box dipped into self-pity again and hoped for a blizzard, so that there would be an audience again.

Fin.


For the ones that made through the whole story, my respects and sincerely gratitude.

Link to the actual "Tiger in Music/Play-box" of old:
https://www.planetminecraft.com/project/windup-tiger-in-box-a-redstone-powered-play-music-box-of-old/

Other info:
- Story original made in my own native language (bigger word knowledge) -> google translated the hell out of it;
- 1424 words, didn't knew I had that much in me;
- Front rendered with: Chunky
- Front after edited with: Gimp

Personally I appreciate more a thoughtful comment/feedback on my writing than a diamond. So leave a comment if you like, having critique or not :-)
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3
08/03/2020 4:24 pm
Level 62 : High Grandmaster Ladybug
Chiaroscuro
Chiaroscuro's Avatar
I like this a lot--I think it's really interesting how you wove the story of the music box into what was going on outside. It made me feel as though there was something special about that music box, as if the changes outside weren't entirely coincidental. I would lean into that more, talk more about the interplay between what happens from the tiger's point of view and what happens from the street kid's point of view. You have the beginnings of a really interesting plotline there so I would say take full advantage of it. Either way, this was a very different and very creative story and I enjoyed it immensely.
3
08/04/2020 11:12 am
Level 56 : Grandmaster Lava Rider
eagoy
eagoy's Avatar
Thanks for long constructive criticism.
Now you mention it, there is indeed no interplay with the tiger and the music-box. It is now more one-way. Might revise this one in the future or take them with the next story. Maybe your contest although I don't have a proper idea about that one yet.

Ps.
If you would like to read similar stories, might I recommend H. C. Anderson (danish). Effectively I tried to mimic his writing style.
2
08/03/2020 3:32 pm
Level 70 : Legendary Elf
PersonWhoPlaysMinecraft
PersonWhoPlaysMinecraft's Avatar
Gosh you're so good at describing things! That's a really good skill to have and I'm not that great at it lol. I also liked how you made it kind of like from the music box's perspective (I think I'm using the wrong term here but I forgot what it was), how you like made it seem as if the music box was alive.
2
08/04/2020 11:15 am
Level 56 : Grandmaster Lava Rider
eagoy
eagoy's Avatar
It seems what I wanted to do (perspective/describing things) worked out. Any things to improve?

Thanks for the comment :-)
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