I'm experimenting
So my fanfic muse has been sick for a good long while now, and I decided maybe it was time to try again.
Title: Being Mutt Williams
Chapter: Prologue, rather; character study
Fandom: Indiana Jones
Setting: Post-KOTCS
Word Count 715
Notes: I don't generally write in first person, but this wasn't flowing in third, so anyway, if it gets awkward in places, it's because my first person voice has never been very practiced.
Also, I have no idea if I'll do anything with this, but the character study felt good.
Prologue
Can I just say that life as Henry Jones III is a whole lot harder than life as Mutt Williams? First of all, just look at the names. Okay, Henry Jones III. Let's be honest, that looks like a guy who walks around always dressed in suits with his hair slicked back. Right? Am I right? He's also at least sixty years old. Mutt Williams? Well, he rides a motorcycle, dropped out of school, does whatever he wants, picks and chooses the books he reads.
I know what you're thinking. I'm complaining. Actually, I'm not. I'm just pointing out that my two names really don't have a whole lot to do with each other, and I am struggling to find a happy medium. I'm looking for the Mutt Jones, if you will.
The first stop on the road to becoming Mutt Jones was to finish school. This initial goal was picked for me, and I can't really blame the old man for choosing it. What else would the associate dean of a college expect of his newly-discovered son? Besides, I finished school in the short time span of only four months. Again, when your tutor is an associate dean who can't stand the fact that his nineteen year old son does not have a high school diploma, you have no choice but to move rather quickly.
But Dad's words kept me motivated: once I hit college, I could take the classes I wanted to, and therefore read what I wanted to. This was a lie, of course. So far general education has been every bit as horrible as prep school was, but he seems to think I have enough patience to put up with it.
I've developed another problem, however. You see, those few days we spent together on that little excursion before we found Mom taught me that archaeology is incredibly cool. Cliché to love what the old man and the gramps loved, but hey, sometimes it just works out that way. You see where this is going though, don't you? Who teaches Intro to Archaeology at Marshall College? Yeah, so guess what happens every day at the dinner table?
"Mutt, have you finished your reading yet?"
"Oh yeah, sure, it was great reading."
"What did you think of the --" Well, from here, you can insert whatever you like, but whatever it is, it's something in far too much detail for me to have actually remembered. These conversations generally lead into a lecture on better reading comprehension, followed by Dad pulling some artifact or another out of a hidden closet I hadn't noticed before, finished off with a reminder that archaeology doesn't happen in the library. Well if archeology doesn't happen in the library, why does he expect me to remember the odd little details that I learn in the library?
Mom's answer for this is very unhelpful. "He remembers all those odd little details, so therefore he expects you to remember them, too. That's what finally brought he and your grandfather back together; they each remembered different odd little details and therefore could work together. Assuming they trusted what each other was saying."
In these talks I always want to point out to her that if I recall the odd little details Dad wants me to recall, I will be remembering Dad's details and not my own. But I never tell her; I know I'd get absolutely no sympathy.
But I'm just griping, you know. To be honest, I like my life as a Jones. In fact, now that I know more about the family and what I was born into, I'm awfully proud to be a Jones Boy. Mom keeps apologizing for not telling me the truth a long time ago, and as angry as it made me at the time, I don't think I would've liked Dad as much at first had I known he was my father. I liked him because he was a friend of Mom's that could be trusted. Were he my father who ran off just before the wedding, that probably would not have been the case. That aside, the more I think about being the son of Indiana Jones, the more I love the sound of it.
As long as he doesn't call me Junior.
Title: Being Mutt Williams
Chapter: Prologue, rather; character study
Fandom: Indiana Jones
Setting: Post-KOTCS
Word Count 715
Notes: I don't generally write in first person, but this wasn't flowing in third, so anyway, if it gets awkward in places, it's because my first person voice has never been very practiced.
Also, I have no idea if I'll do anything with this, but the character study felt good.
Prologue
Can I just say that life as Henry Jones III is a whole lot harder than life as Mutt Williams? First of all, just look at the names. Okay, Henry Jones III. Let's be honest, that looks like a guy who walks around always dressed in suits with his hair slicked back. Right? Am I right? He's also at least sixty years old. Mutt Williams? Well, he rides a motorcycle, dropped out of school, does whatever he wants, picks and chooses the books he reads.
I know what you're thinking. I'm complaining. Actually, I'm not. I'm just pointing out that my two names really don't have a whole lot to do with each other, and I am struggling to find a happy medium. I'm looking for the Mutt Jones, if you will.
The first stop on the road to becoming Mutt Jones was to finish school. This initial goal was picked for me, and I can't really blame the old man for choosing it. What else would the associate dean of a college expect of his newly-discovered son? Besides, I finished school in the short time span of only four months. Again, when your tutor is an associate dean who can't stand the fact that his nineteen year old son does not have a high school diploma, you have no choice but to move rather quickly.
But Dad's words kept me motivated: once I hit college, I could take the classes I wanted to, and therefore read what I wanted to. This was a lie, of course. So far general education has been every bit as horrible as prep school was, but he seems to think I have enough patience to put up with it.
I've developed another problem, however. You see, those few days we spent together on that little excursion before we found Mom taught me that archaeology is incredibly cool. Cliché to love what the old man and the gramps loved, but hey, sometimes it just works out that way. You see where this is going though, don't you? Who teaches Intro to Archaeology at Marshall College? Yeah, so guess what happens every day at the dinner table?
"Mutt, have you finished your reading yet?"
"Oh yeah, sure, it was great reading."
"What did you think of the --" Well, from here, you can insert whatever you like, but whatever it is, it's something in far too much detail for me to have actually remembered. These conversations generally lead into a lecture on better reading comprehension, followed by Dad pulling some artifact or another out of a hidden closet I hadn't noticed before, finished off with a reminder that archaeology doesn't happen in the library. Well if archeology doesn't happen in the library, why does he expect me to remember the odd little details that I learn in the library?
Mom's answer for this is very unhelpful. "He remembers all those odd little details, so therefore he expects you to remember them, too. That's what finally brought he and your grandfather back together; they each remembered different odd little details and therefore could work together. Assuming they trusted what each other was saying."
In these talks I always want to point out to her that if I recall the odd little details Dad wants me to recall, I will be remembering Dad's details and not my own. But I never tell her; I know I'd get absolutely no sympathy.
But I'm just griping, you know. To be honest, I like my life as a Jones. In fact, now that I know more about the family and what I was born into, I'm awfully proud to be a Jones Boy. Mom keeps apologizing for not telling me the truth a long time ago, and as angry as it made me at the time, I don't think I would've liked Dad as much at first had I known he was my father. I liked him because he was a friend of Mom's that could be trusted. Were he my father who ran off just before the wedding, that probably would not have been the case. That aside, the more I think about being the son of Indiana Jones, the more I love the sound of it.
As long as he doesn't call me Junior.