"It despairs me that you acted so greedy cousin; and have gotten your friends and family killed in this unnecessary war."
Yudhistira and his brothers had all gathered near an old abandoned house where they knew Duryodhana fled to after his uncle had been killed in battle. At that moment Duryodhana knew he had lost not just a battle but the war.
Inside the old, dilapidated house Duryodhana was pacing back and forth in front of a crumbling fireplace. "This did not turn out as I foresaw. After I lost Bhishma nothing seemed to play in my favor. Maybe I should have listened to my father and just gave my cousins the small parcel of land they requested..... Who am I kidding?! They did not and still do not deserve any of my kingdom!"
After a few minutes of waiting for Duryodhana to come out of the dilapidated house, Yudhistira and his brothers became impatient.
"You can hide no more Duryodhana", shouted Yudhistira, "The war is over and your time has come!"
Duryodhana went bursting through the front door making it fly off its hinges. He bursted out, "How dare you disgrace me by saying I am hiding! I simply needed to collect my thoughts and figure out what I have to fight or live for anymore. You, the Padavas have taken everything from me. Not an ounce of desire runs through my bones to have my kingdom anymore."
"You brought this upon yourself!", Yudhistira exclaimed, "I even sent Krishna for a final attempt at peace days before the war began! You are an arrogant one though and refused my offer."
"No the matter!" Duryodhana shouted, "This war is not over for me. I will fight you one by one. Right here, right now, toe-to-toe."
"My track record for betting with you is not very good but I will make one final offer to you,Duryodhana. Pick one of my brothers or I to fight and if you win we will give you a parcel of land to live on, unbothered. If you lose, you will die and we will let Yama do with you what he pleases."
Duryodhana chose the youngest of the brothers, Bhima to battle.
"I finally get to test my skills on others besides the soldiers who we just slayed in battle." Bhima eagerly waited for Duryodhana to put on his armor and the fight began.
The fight was evenly matched and what seemed like days later Bhima finally outwitted Duryodhana. In an arrogant moment, Duryodhana got distracted for just a few seconds and Bhima sent his sword crashing down on him.
In that moment, with Bhima still panting over him, Yama descended down from a cloud where he had been watching and waiting to take his next guest to the after world.
Authors Note:
My story begins after Duryodhana has lost the war and everything worth living for.
I kept it very close to the original in that the Pandava brothers find Duryodhana hiding after the war. In the original epic they find Duryodhana under water in a lake where he "Needed the water to cool the fire that is still raging within [him]." Similarly he also has a final battle with Bhima. In the original epic story though Bhima smashes him in the thigh and fatally wounds him.
I wanted to still portray Duryodhana's stubborn attitude even in his moment of death in my story. That is when I decided to keep to the more original story line instead of completely twisting the story around. The gods still intrigue me so I even made Yama a small role even though he is not in the original story.
Bibliography: Narayan's The Mahabharata: A Shortened Modern Prose Version of the Indian Epic.
I like how deep you went into Duryodhana's state of mind prior to the battle. While your focus was probably this mental state, I would suggest extending his inner dialogue to the battle itself. What would he be thinking as he traded blows with Bhima? There are a few minor punctuation errors that should be changed. In the first paragraph, you should delete the comma after the quotation mark. In the second paragraph, you should put a comma between greedy and cousin, since the character is addressing his cousin. There should only be an ellipses in the third paragraph. I *think* four dots is okay if you use a period in the previous sentence. Beyond this, I think you did a good job of bringing Duryodhana's thoughts into the story. I'd enjoy hearing more of what he thought throughout the rest of the Mahabharata.
ReplyDeleteThis read like it was straight out of an English translation of the story. Maybe I should say rewrite since different interpreters seem to have very different outlooks. Either way, it was a good read. You had Yudhistira offer another lifeline which was perfect. Having him let his brother get the 'reward' was also really on-character. Showing off Duryodhana pride and motivations was good too. It was like a really short version of the entire mess really. I enjoyed it!
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