Chicken Korma

"How can you not like Indian food?"
   "What do you mean, how can I not like it? I just don't."
   "It's delicious! The flavours are so intense! I mean, I get it if you don't enjoy spicy food. Nobody likes that sort of blitzkrieg on the digestive system."
   "It's not just the spice though... It's so heavy on onions and garlic. You can't not absolutely stink after you eat a curry! I mean, how is one supposed to go out and pull after having eaten a curry?"
   "Well, I have a girlfriend, so..."
   "You know what I mean."
   "Well, that's a fair point. But why not order something that's a bit more mild? You can get perfectly good curries without having to suffer."
   "Like what?"
   "Chicken korma? It's nicely mild, but got bags of flavour."
   "Isn't that the one that looks like baby poo?"
   "For crying out loud, Tony, will you just man up and try some?"
   "Fine, add a chicken korma onto the takeaway. But if I don't like it, go hungry, and end up dying from starvation it's entirely your fault."
   "God, you're such a drama queen when you've been drinking. Right, they say it'll be here in forty minutes."
   "Cool. Do you want to play chess while we wait?"
   "Sure. Standard drinking rules apply, I assume?"
   "Obviously. What would be the point otherwise?"

Going Nowhere

Like the elves that were said to help shoemakers with their workload in the dead of night, so too the cleaner works in darkness; shrouded in mystery and all but invisible.

   Not that Norman wanted to be known, or even thanked. All the thanks he needed was the weekly deposit into his bank account that allowed him to pay his rent. He was grateful to even have a job, especially after the Civil War. Jobs were few and far between, and were growing yet more scarce. After the Armistice, unemployment rates had soared in what had once been the north of the British Isles, so to have any job at all - even one as menial as cleaning the offices of the Hegemony - was a victory for anyone.
   Norman was listening to an audiobook on his battered, old mp3 player. It had been a gift for his fourteenth birthday, and whilst it was tremendously outdated these days, he had never been able to afford another. He browsed the Northnet every few weeks to try to find an audiobook for free on a subject that interested him. Some were definitely illegal, though others had slipped through the nets of the Censors.
   He had learned about subjects ranging from particle physics to foreign politics, and from time to time managed to get his hands upon a copy of a history book. History was his favourite; most history books had been banned or burned to make way for the "true history" which the Hegemony was distributing amongst its denizens.
   Norman made his way methodically towards the final office in his route. Most of the offices required little cleaning beyond a swift vacuum and a wipe of any dusty surfaces. From time to time there would be half a cup of cold tea left upon a desk, but by and large it was an easy job. The late hours were somewhat prohibitive, but then he didn't have any money to spend on social outgoings.
   As he rounded the corner, he was greeted by a rare sight; a light still on in an office. This was peculiar; the office lights were all turned off at six o'clock, and the only person who could turn them on again before morning was him. Wondering if it was some kind of malfunction, Norman skipped the next three empty rooms and made his way directly towards the harsh yellow light.
   He approached closer to the door and saw shadows moving. Voices mingled with the poor quality of the book being read through his earphones, and the words of both recording and human became blurred and indistinct. Removing the buds from his ears, the voices from the office became clear.
   They were speaking Scots - the language reserved for the elite of the fledgling nation. Norman did not speak the language, but he could tell that the voices belonged to two men. If these men were talking the language of the rulers of the country, Norman did not want to interrupt them.
   He busied himself returning to the other rooms he had missed, and once he had finished he made his way towards the exit.

-*--*--*-

This one ran away with me a little. Lots of things I meant to circle back to but never really managed to do within the time I left myself. I'll just leave it as an exercise in world-building.

King of Fools

They called him the King of Fools, and rightly so. During his final campaign, now known as the Winter Rebellion, he had been bested by the rebel army within four skirmishes.
   The Black King had known that if only he could complete his planned set of manoeuvres, he would be sure of victory. But it had been pride and hubris that had caused him such resounding defeat; determination to execute his own strategy perfectly with no consideration for what the enemy might be doing.
   This is what happened.

   The White foe sent the group of men-at-arms positioned directly in front of their King two-hundred yards straight forward. This was swiftly followed by a group of holy warriors who would struck four-hundred yards diagonally out from behind the defensive ranks to an aggressive forward position.
   The Fool King paid no heed to the opening stages of this battle, not even attempting to put pressure on the holy warriors in their gleaming, white armour as they remained in their forward position. He was busy putting his plans into action and trying to bring his siege towers into play
   The cramped passage in which the armies were fighting meant that do this, his men-at-arms on either side of the army would have to both strike out two-hundred metres apiece, into a tactically weak position. It was a poor opening gambit, to be sure; but if his siege towers could be deployed quickly, he could control the battle with ease.
   Whilst the King of the Black Country tried to realise his plans, the most elite forces of the White army would march three-hundred yards diagonally out, placing themselves just in front of the main ranks of men-at-arms; the Queensmen were ready for blood.
   The White victory was imminent, but the Black King was blind and deaf to the cries of his knights. They screamed at him to defend himself, to deploy a mounted group to defend against the white Queensmen, to do something. But the Fool King simply ignored the warnings and plunged ahead with his attempt to use his siege towers.
   He firmly believed that his strategic wisdom and his final victory would eclipse that of Spartan defeat of the Persian Immortals at Thermopylae; the rightmost tower was deployed forwards, following after the men-at-arms in the front.
   The Queensmen struck. Like lightning, they ran straight forwards, crashing into the Black men-at-arms, slaughtering them almost instantly. The Fool King finally saw his mistake.
   The enemy Queensmen were now in a position to storm his camp, and he knew that he could not defend himself. He could attack of course; his bodyguards were well trained in combat and could destroy the enemy with ease. But this would be folly. The White holy warriors could bombard the position he would take up with bolts from their crossbows, utterly destroying him.
   The Black King collapsed into a heap, unable to stand any longer. He sent an envoy to the White King, with terms to negotiate his surrender.
   The game was done.