I was getting ready in my room for the usual Sunday service. My brother, Joseph was already ready and waiting downstairs. Our father, Elias Strorm, founder of Waknuk in Labrador, was a very religious man. He very much believed and followed Nicholson’s Repentances to the letter, and also the Bible, at least as seen through his eyes, and also Nicholson’s eyes. They were the only two written records that survived the Tribulation.-‘Hurry up Gordon!’- My father shouted from the kitchen. -‘We cannot be late!’- I quickly put on my shoes and went to the kitchen to have breakfast, after my brother said a short prayer. It was my father, Elias, that built our house. It was divided into two main sections which faced two opposite directions, stock-sheds and wash-houses. The house was not too big, but my father was already making plans to enlarge it, and make space for more rooms. The stairs which led down to the dairy and cheese room and the stairs which led up to my and my brother’s room were to be changed, the old wooden boards had cracks and were full of wood boring beetles, who were eating the wood. My father was a man of virtue, and respected by anyone in the village, also because he was very dominant and was not known for tolerance. The only thing my father feared was the devil, and the only image he showed respect to was God. My father was not a man of many emotions and thought of them as weaknesses. I was doing my best to catch up with the others and get ready for the Sunday service because did not want to annoy my father today, just like any other Sunday, as it was the only day he was more peaceful and less “bossy” towards people, and ruining his good mood, which would only happen once a week, would be a real shame. I am not saying that during sundays my father would become sweet, loving and gentle, but he would surely not be as strict and severe, and his patience would last a little longer than usual. Being the son of the founder of the city, even the preacher was sometimes a nuisance. The town, being very small with only a few people, meant that everybody knew everybody else, and that word got around quickly about any news and anything that happened in general, which means that soon there was some chatter about me. I was a rather tall child, being taller than my older brother, and had long arms too. When I was small it was less noticeable, but at around the age of 13 it became more obvious and now at 14 people were starting to question whether I was pure after all. ‘It is not normal for a person to have arms and legs that long! It doesn’t follow the image!’- some said. I knew I was different, an abomination, a blasphemy, but I tried my best to hide it from others.-‘Maybe I am just a little different, just taller.’- I thought to myself, but deep within I knew the truth. I tried my best to stay out of sight of others, and when I was, I would make sure I was wearing long pants and shirt and would try to make all of myself taller, to try to seem more proportional. Some people were not happy nonetheless, and I knew that word would quickly get to my father. The first time this came up was a few weeks ago, when some kids started calling be abomination and blasphemy, and started threatening to tell their parents, or worse, my father. I tried my best to avoid such children, and sometimes such adults, but I couldn't always, which led to much teasing and sometimes to fights. This quickly became worse and worse and so I had decided to do something, and just in time as well. My brother came home from working on the fields and I had just finished cleaning the kitchen, and was heading to my room to rest for a while when he grabbed me by my arm, and looked at me with a serious, disapproving look -’Gordon, you are a blasphemy aren’t you! You with your abnormal legs and arms!’- He said. Luckily there was no one in the house to hear.-’Shut up! I am no blasphemy, how dare you say that regarding you own brother! Just because I am taller than you!’- I answered as I pulled away my arm from his grip. As I quickly and angrily walked away, he said -’ We’ll see soon enough. I’ve heard other people talking, a child your age shouldn’t be this tall, at least not his legs and arms. Maybe you will grow out of it, they said, but I doubt it! I think you are a blasphemy! Always been!’-’You better be quiet about this! I am normal, and you shouldn’t be listening on other people’s conversations or spreading false rumors! Leave me alone!’- I answered as I entered my room and slammed the door behind me. I quickly sat down. My heart was beating as if I had just run across the whole farm. I was sweating, almost panting. -’I have to leave’- I thought to myself -’ I have to leave before my father finds out’-. Because I knew what would happen if my father found out. The best case scenario, I would be sterilized and sent into the fringes, where all the abominations lived, or were sent there, a terrible place, full or mutants and were the plants don’t grow right, where the devil rules, it is said, where there is no prosperity and no joy, no order, where beast and men are too similar to tell the difference. The worst, I would be killed. Either with a knife, like they killed a bull that had three horns, or burned, like they would burn the crops when they came out too large or too small, or a different color. I found it quite hard to fall asleep. I kept thinking about the perfect time for me to leave the house, and I knew I could not have waited too long as my arms were becoming a concern, and many people in the village where starting to notice that they were too long for a boy my age. I thought that the perfect time for me to leave the house and head to the fringes, with the other blasphemies, would have been Sunday next week, as it is a day when everyone is at church celebrating the holy day. I would have escaped tonight, if it wasn’t for the fact that I did not pack anything yet. During the few days which followed, I started taking some extra breaks from the work in the field, in order to have time to pack clothes, food and water needed for my journey, and also to avoid been in public for too long. I was still unsure whether the fringes were a good destination, but I did not see any other options, as the Fringes were the only inhabited place where they accepted blasphemies. After the Fringes, came the the Badlands, which was said to go on forever, where nothing grew and nothing survived. On Sunday later that week I picked up all of the essential needs I packed during the week, and when I was sure that my parents and my brother were asleep I tiptoed downstairs, and quietly crept my way to the kitchen, making sure not to make any noise. I then went to the barn outside, where the weapons were kept. I slowly opened the door, hoping for it not to squeak. I stepped in quietly and closed the door behind me as carefully as I had opened it. I slowly made my way through the barn, thankfully all the animals were sleeping and I managed to make my way to the back and grabbed a quiver full of arrows and a bow. I then slowly made my way back to the front and took a horse for myself. I took my own horse, mainly because I knew him better and he knew me, so he wouldn’t make any noise or refuse to obey my commands. I brought him out and quietly shut the door behind me. I got onto the saddle and put my bag on it as well and quietly led him to the woods behind our house. The horse neighed and whinnied as it entered the dark woods that led to the fringes. As I led the horse into the wood I looked behind me, to take a last look at my house, my family, everything I was leaving behind me, for ever. As I look sadly at the house a light suddenly went on, and then a window was opened just as my father started shouting my name, calling me to come back. As I kicked the horse for it to go faster I caught a glimpse of my father looking at me, and then running downstairs, screaming for the other men that worked there to wake up. I knew that my father would not stop looking for me. Not because he loved me deeply and wanted to make sure I was ok. No, I knew he was suspicious about me already. Yesterday I could notice him looking at me while I did the dishes, staring at my arms and legs, almost as if he was making observations in his mind, judging my body and my height against that of my brother, and other kids. I overheard them that night, since I couldn’t sleep, talking about talking to me and bringing in the inspector, who would judge whether I was a blasphemy or not. My mother asked what they would do if I was considered a blasphemy. My father never replied, but I knew what would happen. My father wrote the law himself, and I knew very well what would happen to me. If I was lucky I would have been sterilized, and then sent to the Fringes. If not, well, they’d kill me. But they would keep searching, my father would never allow a blasphemy to escape and procreate. He wanted all of them dead! That made me a real threat, and they’d rather not take the chance of me escaping. I kicked my horse harder, and it got up to a fast trot, then a gallop. As I went further and further I could hardly hear the faint screaming in the background as a search party was sent for me. I didn’t stop, and the horse went faster and faster through the woods. This went on for a few hours, until I could barely see stars in the sky as the sun rose. I stopped for a bit. I listened. Nothing. I decided to keep going for a while more, until I became tired and hungry. I then decided to stop to rest and eat, and also to listen for people following me. I stopped by an area with a large group of trees tightly packed together where I had almost like a wall behind me. I stopped for a second to listen again. Still nothing. I then sat down and ate a part of a loaf of bread I had brought with me, and then I slept a bit. I woke up to the horse poking my face with his face a few hours later, as the sun was now directly above my head. I stopped to listen and my heart skipped a beat from fear as I could barely hear screaming in the far distance, from the direction I came. I quickly packed everything up and got onto the horse, and started galloping away, this time veering more to the southeast instead of going straight south, as I had done before. By going southeast, I led the horse outside the vague paths that there were, hoping that our traces would be lost. This did not work very well, because going outside the path and into the trees made the footprints of my horse much more visible on the grass. My father and his search parties kept following me, which made me realise I had to plan my next moves, instead of making decisions on-the-spot. I realised I was now an offence in every way according to the law, and that if seen, I could get legally shot by anyone. I also thought that they probably already put me in the “WANTED” list, under the section “dead or alive” because I remembered they did this to an offence which tried to escape in the past, and did not succeed. It was now time to plan my next move. I decided what to do next by choosing from a range of the wisest decisions I could think of. I started by assuming that they troop would move during the day, and not the night, as they would rest and most citizens do not like to move in the dark. If I moved during the day as well, just like they did, I thought that eventually they would catch up and get me before I reached the Fringes, as they would move faster, and being in a group, they would not have to worry about any animals or beasts that lurked around in the woods., and would not need to avoid any checkpoints, having their normality certificate at hand. So I decided to move at night, starting during the evening, when the sun went down, and ending late morning, after the sun was out for a while. During the first and second day of me having to apply this routine, I sometimes heard noises in the distance coming from northwest, the way the troops were coming from. Being by myself, it was even harder for me to stay safe at night, as no one would guard, and also waking up on time was a problem as I would not be always on time. To make sure I did not wake up too late, before I went to sleep, I would drink a lot of water, so that later in the day I would wake up to urinate. I realised that this did waste a lot of my precious water, but I felt that waking up on time was number one as a priority. This went on for a few days, until I could not hear or notice anyone following me anymore, so I decided to stop for a while. My water supply was already running low, so I decided to go to the river again, to fill up both of the water containers that were carried by the horse. I got onto the horse again and started moving west. The trip to the stream took about three days, and when I got there I decided to rest there a while longer, since I hadn’t had a shower in more than a week, and I could also find fishes in the river every now and then. I started to get back to sleeping at night and moving southward along the river by day, slower now, sometimes even walking along beside the horse. As I was pretty far from the house, I could clearly see that the plants and animals were pretty different already. I could see plants with bright pink flower petals and lizards with two tails, or birds with abnormally long beaks and legs, or spiders with 10 legs. I could see trees with barks so thick my arrows barely stick to it, and even the fish were weird, with extra fins or weird eyes. I was in a place where blasphemies and mutants and abominations prospered, and where the “norm” was the minority. As I was walking along with the horse one day I suddenly heard shouting behind me, and as I turned around I saw a man running towards me from far off, and as I panicked my way to the horse, I looked back again to see two more men coming from both sides of the river in horses, and the other man that was running towards me was now shooting arrows at me. I kicked the horse as hard as I could and moved to the forest. Arrows were flying past me, bouncing off some trees and completely cutting through others. I bowed over and held the horse’s neck with my arms and his back with my knees as best as I could and continued to kick him until he was running incredibly fast. I managed to get far ahead of them for them to break up and search for me individually. I knew that they’d kill me if they found me, and if they didn’t, they’d send for more search parties. So I either had to run away to a “safe” place really quickly, or I would have to kill all three of them. I prepared my bow. I kept moving west, but slower, and always listening, looking behind my back, with an arrow already strung to my bow, ready to be shot. As I stopped to listen, I heard branches cracking and hoofs hitting the dirt. I stopped, looked towards the source of the noise. I readied my bow, raised it and prepared to shoot. A horse with a rider suddenly appeared out of the trees a few meters in front of me, so I aimed and shot at him. He fell of his horse, and I went over to him to check if he was dead, and sure enough he was. I took his horse and using a rope he had attached it to my own. I also took his weapons and supplies, loading them in into the other horse. I then decided to head southeast, and I knew that the other two men would follow me. I moved slowly, with my bow at the ready. I would stop every now and then to listen, and eventually I found the two other horsemen, and did to them as I had done to the other one. By the end I had four bows, hundreds of arrows and four horses. I felt terrible for killing the men, men I knew, men that now wanted to kill me. I was confused and afraid. Sad, but also excited to have accomplished something like this, somewhat proud of having survived, but also ashamed of having killed someone. I continued on my journey for another 2 weeks, adjusting my course though the ever changing landscape, always more and more abnormal, full of abominations, until I came to the end of the forest, to the Fringes, just as my supplies were about to finish. I could see some makeshift buildings in the distance, and some people coming out. I had safely arrived at the most dangerous place I knew.
My Rationale
Our Project goal is to try to understand the thought process of the author as he wrote the book, and how the way he wrote it links all the different elements together to achieve a specific purpose. We plan to write another chapter of the book, a prologue, about the protagonist’s uncle, which was a mutant, and we plan to tell the story of how he ran away to the Fringes, and why he did so. We hope that by writing another chapter of the book we will better understand the thought process the author went through and we might be able to replicate his reasoning to a certain extent. One of the first things that I did was to try to best assign the other people in my group to tasks that would best suit them and the rest of the group. I decided on who would write the majority of the text, and who would do the edits and make sure that the text reads correctly and that it makes sense, and that the style of writing would match that of the author. I then started writing the story. I wrote a quick plot for the story, what would happen in what order to get to the specific end I wanted. I decided on a plot somewhat similar to that of David himself on The Chrysalids, where the protagonist would run away from his house due to him being a mutant. My role was to do most of the writing, to figure out the plot elements and so on, I would make the rough draft to be edited by the other group members. This meant that I would have to make certain decisions regarding the plot and how it unfolds. One of the decisions I had to make was whether his parents would find out about him before or after he ran away. I decided that many people would know before, so that the protagonist would be able to feel afraid and scared of losing his life, adding to the emotion of the story, but that his parents would also know the day before he ran away, so that there would have even more reason to run away, so that he might really have to leave, at the last minute. Another decision I had to make for example was whether the protagonist would kill the men searching after him or not. I decided that he would, because I thought that this would not only make the story more interesting but would also show that when he was discriminated against and persecuted that forced him to take tough decisions. A third decision I made was whether or not to continue writing about the protagonist going inside the fringes or not, and whether he is welcomed there or not. I decided to just finish the chapter as he arrives, but not writing about whether he is welcomed and safe or not. I did this partially because we know he makes it safely, as he is still alive in The Chrysalids, and also because he had already gone through the part I wanted to explore, the persecution from his family, so I decided that it was best to just leave it at that, otherwise we wouldn’t have time either. I think that these choices were the right choices to make because they allowed us to write a chapter that explores the ideas of discrimination and how they affect people in a bad way. The choices allowed us to explore these ideas because they did not distract us from the main theme, to go explore other topics, and because they allowed us to actually finish writing. These choices, amongst other made by other group members, allowed us to better link the elements of the chapter we wrote, so that it wouldn’t be a bunch of separate stories, but rather one continuous story exploring one topic. I think that my choices were quite important for the success of the group, as I was the one who wrote most of the things and actually had the idea on writing about Gordon and his escape, and it was decided that this idea should actually be implemented with the other group members. In conclusion I agree with the inquiry statement, I think that by writing a chapter of the novel myself I better understand how the author has linked the elements of the novel to achieve a specific purpose, because by linking different elements you can make the novel not only more interesting to read but more effective at portraying it’s message, instead of just making arbitrary decisions.