The Killers (modern adaptation)

“i’ll take a bag of chips,” the man called Al said. He was wearing a black Addidas tracksuit and a snapback. His face was partially hidden by his hood. He also wore a pair of leather gloves and had a bandana around the bottom half of his face.

“Give me some chicken,” demanded the other man named Max. He was about the same size as Al.

“How much do you want?” asked George, the man behind the counter.

“Why don’t you tell me the portions then ask that question again.” By now everyone could tell that Max was getting annoyed, even Nick the man down the counter.

“All of the portion sizes and prices are on the board over there,” George pointed to a board just above the counter.

“I’ll have a medium then, and a coke,” Max demanded.

“Sorry we don’t have any coke at the minute.”

“No coke! What sort of a place are you running? I guess i’ll have a sprite then, and you’d better stop wasting my time.”
George laughed in an attempt to play it off as a joke.

“what are you laughing at?” Al asked.

“nothing,” George replied.

“Oh, so you think we’re stupid do you? Hey Max this guy thinks we’re stupid!”

“Leave him, we have business to take care of,” Max told Al.

“Just give me a minute, i’ve had an idea,” Al turned to face George, “Do u know where a man called Ole lives?”

“Yeah, Why?” George replied.

“Coz he’s not gonna be around much longer, and neither are you if you don’t tell us where he lives,”
Max said to George.

“Oh ok he lives in the estate down there. Number 63 now please just go and leave me alone.”

“We cant make any promises. But if anyone asks we were never here. Got it?” Al said to George.

“Yes, yes ok. Now please just leave.” Al and Max left the shop without paying. George smirked as they did so.

“You should have killed him Max”

“Why?”

“He knows to much.”
“He barely knows anything, not even our names.”

“Yeah but Max, he know where we’re going and why we’re going there And what if he knows Ole and its a setup,” Al’s words were cut short as three men came around the corner.

“Oy you two come here,” one of the men said.

“Are you looking for Ole?” Another one said.

“Yeah,” Al said

“No,” Max said

“Your coming with us then,” the third one said.

“ok fine,” Al said.

“Do I have to come as well?” Max asked.

“Shut up and follow me,” one of the men said.
The five of them arrived at number 63, Oles house. The three men dropped Al and Max of then left.
“Here you go Ole, we’re off now.”

“So Al, Max, whatever your names are I don’t really care. Besides it wont even matter soon anyways,” Ole said to Max and Al.

“Why wont it matter?” Max asked Ole.

“Why do u think?” Ole replied.

“I don’t know.”

“Well I guess its going to be a surprise, not a very nice one but a surprise nonetheless.”
“So anyways I heard youve been giving my man George down at the chicken shop trouble.”

“Yeah,” Al said

“No,” Max said

“Well in that case you,” he pointed to Max, “shut up and you,” he pointed to Al, “do the talking.”

“Ok,” Al said

Max said nothing

“Why did you want to know where I live and what were you planning on doing to me?” Ole asked.

“I – I don’t know what you’re talking about, all we did was went to the chicken shop and got rude. It wont happened again I promise.”

“You bet it wont happen again, wanna know why?” Ole raised a gun to Al’s head.
BANG. Ole was struck in the head by a lamp thrown by Max.

“Hurry up lets get out of here now!”
The two of them ran as fast as possible out of the estate, past the chicken shop and out onto the street.

“I swear i’m leaving the gang as soon as possible, im not about that life anymore,” Max panted

“Yeah same, i’m not even gonna go to the same park as them anymore.”

“Do you think we should call the police though?” Max asked.

“Then what? Tell them we terrorised a chicken shop guy and tried to kill a gang leader?”

“Oh yeah, didn’t really think that that through.”

“I don’t think we thought any of this through,” Al said.

“Well i’ve gotta be home soon, got stuff to do,” Max said

“Yeah i’m gonna head off now, footy tomorrow?” Al asked

“Yeah sure see you then.”
They went separate ways and carried on with their lives.

fiction 1

Book: POD
Author: Stephen Wallenfels

POD is an action adventure book set in the post apocalyptic remains of a Los Angeles hotel car park and a house In Washington state, this helps the readers thematic understanding a lot because this book is all about survival and if it’s set in a world where everything is normal with no destruction or chaos how are we supposed to believe that it’s the apocalypse. The reason it is set in two different locations is that the story is told in alternating first person chapters.

The overall story of the book is that the world has been invaded by mysterious floating pods that destroy anything or anyone stupid enough to go outside into the open, and because of this our two main characters are forced to survive in their current locations. For a 12 year old girl called Megs that location would be, as I said earlier, a multi-storey hotel car park. However for our other main character josh, he is bound to his house with his engineer dad and pet dog. But as time passes both Josh and Megs realise they are running out of supplies.

This is where the rugged individualism kicks in as they are forced to do everything in their will to get food, water, medical supplies and ultimately to just survive. The theme of rugged individuality was present in most if not all of the characters because a rugged individual is a person that should be able to fend for themselves without any help from others, such as people who live off the land and grow their own food. The reason I think that everyone alive in this story is a rigged individual is that you cant just expect other people to help you out in an apocalypse, and in this book it’s basically every man for themselves.

My essay question is “Why does Brutus not want to swear an oath of elegance.”

I believe the answer of this question to be that Brutus does not want to swear an oath because he likes to think himself of a nobler person in the roman society. As a consequence of this all the power that that gives him goes to his head, which in time makes him feel like he is the best around and everyone should follow him. As a consequence in act 2 scene 1 he tries to act like the leader of the conspiracy despite being the newest member, he does this by disagreeing and shutting down all suggestions that people ask (despite most of them being good suggestions). These also eventually come back to haunt him. Such as when he chose not to kill Antony because he thought he was noting without Caesar.

I think that Brutus does not want the conspirators to swear an oath of allegiance, because as i said earlier, he likes to think of himself being better and nobler than the rest of the conspirators and he is not just part of the gang, but if he takes the oath he will be lowering himself to their level. He might also want to think that they do not need an oath to stay true to their word that they will kill Caesar for the good of Rome. Also if they don’t have the motives to do it whats the point, he says that in act 2,1 “If these be motives weak, break off betimes.” he might also be disagreeing because it was Cassius who suggested an oath and Cassius is currently the leader of the conspiracy however Brutus want to be so to show that he purposefully disagrees with all of Cassius’s propositions, such as keeping Anthony alive even though it was a bad decision. “For Antony is but a limb of Caesar.” Brutus says this when he just joined the conspirators and they were discussing things such as taking an oath, letting Anthony join, etc.

I also have some quotes directly from the play to back up my reasoning, one of which is “Not that I love Caesar less but that I loved Rome more.” This is basically saying that Brutus did not kill caesar out of hatred or anger, but instead out of his nobility and loyalty to the city of Rome, suggesting that he would do nearly anything for the city, even killing his best friend, Caesar. I think that he makes this out to be ambition as a way of hiding his true intentions.

Other people may have a different thoughts on this matter though, and I take them into account, such as the people who may think that swearing an oath makes their intentions of killing Caesar look evil and not for the good of the people because by swearing an oath it makes it seem like they don’t want to do it but have to out of duty, which is partially true but not completely because they all as far as we know, still wanted to do it and weren’t being forced or pressured into it.

Some people may also say that Brutus is not the honourable man that people make him out to be. They say this because Caesar had been one of his closest friends for a long time and instead of tutus talking to him about his concerns and worries that he is getting too ambitious, he just kills him. So how can you be a noble man if your best friend and the person who you are most loyal to (loyalty being a big part of nobility) you kill without a second thought, so Brutus is less of a noble man and more of s stone cold killer who takes no one else into account and tries to protect himself by saying it was his ‘duty’ to Rome that made him.

My final thoughts on this topic are that Brutus is not the noble man that everyone makes him out to be and it is because of this that he tries to manipulate the conspirators so that he is the leader, as i said earlier, he does this by disagreeing with everyones points and making himself heard so everyone listens to him and is to scared to speak up against him as he is the so called ‘noblest man in rome’

I think that Brutus does not want the conspirators to swear an oath of allegiance, because as i said earlier, he likes to think of himself being better and nobler than the rest of the conspirators and he is not just part of the gang, but if he takes the oath he will be lowering himself to their level. He might also want to think that they do not need an oath to stay true to their word that they will kill Caesar for the good of Rome. Also if they don’t have the motives to do it whats the point, he says that in act 2,1 “If these be motives weak, break off betimes.” he might also be disagreeing because it was Cassius who suggested an oath and Cassius is currently the leader of the conspiracy however Brutus want to be so to show that he purposefully disagrees with all of Cassius’s propositions, such as keeping Anthony alive even though it was a bad decision. “For Antony is but a limb of Caesar.” Brutus says this when he just joined the conspirators and they were discussing things such as taking an oath, letting Anthony join, etc.

I also have some quotes directly from the play to back up my reasoning, one of which is “Not that I love Caesar less but that I loved Rome more.” This is basically saying that Brutus did not kill caesar out of hatred or anger, but instead out of his nobility and loyalty to the city of Rome, suggesting that he would do nearly anything for the city, even killing his best friend, Ceaser.

My essay question is “Why does Brutus not want to swear an oath of elegance.”

I believe the answer of this question to be that Brutus does not want to swear an oath because he likes to think himself of a nobler person in the roman society. As a consequence of this all the power that that gives him goes to his head, which in time makes him feel like he is the best around and everyone should follow him. As a consequence in act 2 scene 1 he tries to act like the leader of the conspiracy despite being the newest member, he does this by disagreeing and shutting down all suggestions that people ask (despite most of them being good suggestions). These also eventually come back to haunt him. Such as when he chose not to kill Antony because he thought he was noting without Caesar.

Some of the quotes i will be looking at in detail are

I think that Brutus does not want the conspirators to swear an oath of allegiance because he likes to think of himself being better and nobler than the rest of the conspirators and he is not just part of the gang but if he takes the oath he will be lowering himself to their level. Also he might want to think that they do not need an oath to stay true to their word that they are going to kill Caesar for the good of rome, and if they don’t have the motives to do it whats the point, he says that in act 2,1 ‘If these be motives weak, break off betimes.’ he might also be disagreeing because it was Cassius who suggested an oath and Cassius is currently the leader of the conspiracy but Brutus want to be so to show that he purposefully disagrees with all of Cassius’s propositions, such as keeping Anthony alive even though it was a bad decision.

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