The Apprentice: A Short Story

The apprentice: a short story

The apprentice slowly backed away from her work, putting her spatula down and eyeing the sculpture thoughtfully. She had been working on it for weeks on end, almost obsessive in her dedication to form the clay just right, to stay true to her reference material; down to the subtle bend of each little eyelash.

They were delicate enough to snap in half with the most minuscule application of force, and had drawn many curses from her lips during the tedious sculpting process.

She knew very well that she could have used a wire armature to spare herself the trouble, but she was nothing if not stubborn in her approach, and real eyelashes didn't have any armatures.

Shifting her gaze from the delicate things, her eyes settled on the area where the sculpture's nose meets it's mouth, admiring the elegant curve of the cupid's bow which had taken her countless attempts to get just right. Every prior attempt perfectly decent, yet still inferior to the next.

Nodding approvingly, her gaze shifted further yet, settling on the juncture where the sculpture's jaw meets it's neck. It was well executed, - anyone could see that, it was plain as day. It didn't take a master to point it out. -

Except for one thing,

The neck was too short.

The apprentice clenched her fists at the discovery, cursing herself as she reached for her previously abandoned spatula. With a calm, yet almost frenzied look in her eyes, she began to separate the sculpted head from the neck of it's static body, taking diligent care in avoiding any and all unnecessary damage.

She would of course have mended any such damage with the same level of precision that had been applied to every other step in this tedious journey, but it would have been a waste of precious effort to sculpt what had already been sculpted to perfection, so she focused back on the task at hand; to fix the mistake she had already - foolishly - made.

Setting the head down on a small table to her right, she picked up some clay and got to work.

-------------------------------

Once satisfied with her performance, she carefully retrieved the head from her right, scored and coated both it and the top of the neck in slip, and painstakingly joined them together as if they never had been separated in the first place.

Once again, she set her spatula aside and examined her work, her scrutinizing gaze unforgiving of even the tiniest inaccuracy.

Finally content with her handicraft, she breathed an appeased sigh before turning her gaze to her left, where her master sat as model for her ambitious project. It had taken quite a bit of convincing on her part, but she had eventually gotten her way, just like she knew she would.

Smiling at her master, she approached him, a fond look on her face as she spoke, her left hand resting gently on his stoic face:

"You sat so patiently for me, master. I hope I've done you justice."

Her hand reluctantly left his face, it's gaze unmoving from it's spot on the sculpture that depicted it's likeness, as it had been for the last few weeks.

Even in death, his piercing gaze betrayed not even the shallowest of thoughts that hid behind those eyes.

My prompts for this short story were:

Perfect, Separate, Sculpture, and Learn ^-^

A Spot of Cream: a short story

The man stared into his coffee mug, swirling the cloudy liquid absent-mindedly and observing how the thin layer of cream gathered in the center, a melancholy yet fond look on his paling face. The sun was beginning to peak through the kitchen window, as evident by the way the morning light was just shy of touching his hand where it laid idly on the kitchen table

Just under half an hour ago, he had returned home from the store, having left to get the very cream that was currently occupying his attention upon discovering that what little he had left had spoiled overnight.

He listened to the gentle pitter-patter outside, and breathed a content sigh, taking another sip of his morning coffee. He could feel the subtle warmth of the rising sun creeping up on his hand, having never left it's place on the table beside his favourite mug.

The man smiled to himself, - it was a resigned, barely-there quirk of the lips, just in the corners of his mouth, - as he took another sip of his now luke-warm coffee and ignored the steadily growing feeling of numbness stemming from his hand, now completely illuminated by the morning rays.

Pulling his eyes away from the coffee mug, he watched with fascination as the light gleamed like gold flakes in the scarlet that covered his, now limp, pale fingers.

His gaze shifted further up, settling just above his wrist, where the bite had begun to turn the surrounding skin a sickly greyish shade of what had been a lively peach just an hour ago.

The man sighed once more, and took yet another sip of his, now cold, morning coffee.

Soon, he would join the pitter-patter outside, all for a spot of cream in his coffee.

My prompts for this story were:

Virus, Sound, Mug, Result :]

Aw heck, man

*spontaneously combusts*

BEAUTIFUL PERSON AWARD!❣️ Once you are given this award you're supposed to paste it in the asks of 8 people you adore! Absolutely no pressure but. It's sweet to know someone thinks you're beautiful inside and out <3

Guess I'll die /j

Does it still count as shading if I'm just alpha-locking the line-art and "shading" that? Lmfao

I felt like putting some clothes on the buggy dude! ^-^

I included a close-up of the second version, since tumblr loves to just *eat up* all the details TTvTT

It's heavily inspired by my own wardrobe/general sense of fashion lmao, I basically have those jeans, as well as that belt and that orange sweater, and I love to mix my metals :]

And he may not have any nails, but who says you can't wear nail polish just because of that? Bahahaha

Bro I am still so fucking proud of how my bug boy turned out, that pose was 100% just my brain working overtime, underpaid, with not nearly enough resources lmfao

I looked at a picture of a stick insect to figure out the buggy ends of his limbs, but that's literally it

Sorry I just had to get that out of my system bahahaha, it was eating me alive TTvTT

Stickbug out ✌🪲