A/N: OMFG... it's been way way WAY too long since I last posted something on this site. I felt so bored and I was looking over my stuff on here and I needed some new material for the profile. lol.

This was an English IV project I did recently for The Pardoner's Tale by Geoffrey Chaucer. This was the assignment:

-Choose at least 4 stanzas from "The Pardoner's Tale" and rewrite them in your own words. (poetry form)

-OR-

-Write a summary of the story in your own words. Must be 3 to 4 paragraphs long. It can be written as a poem, rap or short story.

As you could all tell, I chose a short story and it ended up being about 5 pages long. I haven't a clue what the grade on it is yet, so reviews for this would make me really happy. I think I did my best with it. And if there are any grammer mistakes, I'm sorry. I read and re-read this thing so many times I know it by heart now. So any I missed will totally throw me for a loop... so don't mention it, please? I just wanna know if I made the assignment in your eyes. The grammer will be fixed by my English IV teacher.

Seth’s Story

--S.A--

Seth Johnson walked along the stage, his boots thump, thump, thumping on the polished wooden floor. The audience was filled to the brim with 7th and 8th graders. A few high school students here and there were also present. He knew he’d be giving this message out, but not to these people. He didn’t even think his story would be okay for them.

Once he hit the middle of the stage, he stood before them. The remainder of noise died down as he allowed the audience to take in his dark appearance. His black jeans fitted against hi legs snugly, as did the black shirt and the handcuffs around his wrists. He didn’t do anything wrong, he just liked wearing them.

He stared at them all with his dark green eyes and looked like he was about to scold each and every one of them. After there was a nervous tension in the air, he easily broke it with a startling “BOO!” which made everyone jump. He only laughed and sat himself down on the floor of the stage and swung his feet over the edge.

“You all know very well that you all would have done that to me,” he said, tossing a dashing smile to all of them. “So I’m merely putting myself on your level so we have some level ground under us.” He pulled the handcuffs off of his wrists and hooked them to his belt before continuing.

“I’m young, you think, maybe about nineteen or so. You’d be right. But in all this time, I’ve been studying the Bible for most of it. My parents raised me much like your parents raise you… and let’s all be honest; we’re all not honest. I know I’m not. But what I will tell you is that I’ve seen so much sin in the world today.”

He got up and walked up and down the stage on the floor. He looked at the students in the front row, smiling at the few who smiled at him and matching faces like he too was one of them.

“Greed is the largest one. Envy is probably the next and Lust is the third. Then you have the other four…. Forget about them, they weren’t that important in Fullmetal Alchemist, anyway.” The crowd laughed at the reference to an anime show on TV. They knew what he was talking about. Seth leaned against the stage and folded his arms across his chest and looked at them again.

“Money,” he said. “Let’s talk about money. Be very honest with me: If you had all the money to yourself to do with as you pleased, would you go wild with it on yourself and your friends and send none of it towards charity? C’mon, lemme see those hands.”

There was quite a bit of hesitance, but slowly hands began to rise. After maybe a few minutes, more than three-quarters of the audience had their hands raised. Seth motioned them to lower them as he continued: “Radix malorum est cupiditas.”

He paused after letting it sink in before thrusting himself forward and saying it louder. “Radix malorum est cupiditas! Greed for wealth is the root of all evil!” He hopped back onto the stage and pulled the curtains away to reveal a large pile of glittering gold. Sure it was fake - only little pieces of metal with gold paint - but it look realistic enough to get the entire audience in awe at the spectacle.

As Seth opened the curtain more, a large tree set up on a fake hill was shown with three men beneath it. They didn’t move. Beside them were a few knives and some bottles. They were dressed oddly to the audience and to Seth - dressed in gallant clothes like the men from the Medieval Times. Seth looked at them and made tsking sounds as he shook his head.

“They came to an untimely death,” he said, nudging the foot of one of them. “They were taken over by Greed of Wealth when they saw the gold. The lead man over here,” he indicated the one with the red cloak. “He was the one who said, ‘Certainly, is seems fortune gave us this gold so we’d no longer have to work and slave in the cold.’ Mmhmm… that’s right. These two tagged along on their search.”

Seth turned and covered the scene again with the curtain and looked back at the audience. He looked around again and cleared his throat. The lights in the theater dimmed so only the stage was lit.

“My story begins in a bar, where three friends party all weekend, drinking cheap gin. They like to create riots as well as gamble their lives away. They live the life of loose women and pick fights.”

The curtains opened again and the setting of a bar was showed. The door opened and another man walked in and ordered a drink and drank from the goblet. He was distressed about something that he had no trouble with making it known.

“Death is a thief!” he wailed. “My good friend was asleep and suddenly he just stopped breathing. I do hope he rests in peace and that he isn’t stressed in his end. I guess people everywhere should be ready for Death.”

Seth stepped up and looked out at the audience. “But the three friends had heard enough and began to curse and debated the man’s words.”

“I’ve heard enough about Death!” the head of the troupe said, hitting his goblet on the table. Towns everywhere are susceptible to his hands. What’s so scary about him anyway? If he is my foe, he breathes the same air as I and bleed he could.” He pulled his two friends closer. “Listen, friends, I’m telling it as it is, Death is a villain and we need to put an end to him.”

“The rest agreed,” Seth told the audience. “And the three friends took to the streets to indeed search for their foe. To take out Death was their goal, and nothing will waver them from it. As drunken they were, they were going to show Death who the bosses were.

“So they set out on their journey to destroy Death, but along the road they met and old man.”

“You there,” the head said. “How is it you are so old but have not died?”

The old man looked at the first guy and tapped around the stick he used to keep himself upright.

“I am cursed with life like a creature God hates,” he said. “I pray for Death to take me. But he hasn’t once touched a bony finger upon my rotting skin. So, until Death comes to take me, I live on.”

“This didn’t settle with the head of the group,” Seth told the audience. “In fact, he didn’t like it and had an idea about who this man really was.”

“You are a spy for Death!” he accused. “He gives you everlasting life to go around and not be marred. But I tell you, my good man, nothing brings about a confession better than weapons.”

As the head was about to pull his sword, the others stop him.

“Where can we find Death?” the youngest asked. The old man gawked at them for a moment.

“Find Death?” he repeated. “Find Death? Ah, perhaps you will. There is a hill over yonder with a tree. That is where he lives.”

As he walked away, the three walked towards the ext to the stage. Seth came back up as the curtains closed.

“It seems like they may have found their adversary,” he said quietly. The entire theater was silent as the grave. Seth thought about what it was that made them like so. They weren’t expecting this, he thought to himself. He moved to the side and sat on a provided stool as the curtain opened again to the site of the tree and the gold. The three men showed back up onto the stage and looked at the gold with twinkling eyes.

“Without dragging on,” Seth continued. “The story is told. Of course, these three rioters found under the tree this pile of glorious gold. They all smiled like demons and hatched violent schemes, and had forgotten about their previous plan. Apparently, there is work of greater importance.”

“Fortunately,” the first said. “God has given us this gold so we no longer have to work and slave in the cold. And fortune favors those spenders so we must spend this treasure on our own pleasures. But we must be cautious. Showing with this much money is too suspicious. The Law would disallow it.”

“And since they had plenty of time before they could haul it off by the cover of night, they drew sticks to find who it would be to find food and wine.” Seth stood up and walked down the stairs into the audience and walked up and down the aisles a little. “The youngest drew the cut stick, and so he ran off to fetch the provisions. But there was something else at work here.”

When the younger man left the stage, the other two huddled up, the leader’s arm around the shoulder’s of the other.

“There is quite a bit of gold here,” he said. “And it should be split by three, but think of the possibilities if we were to divide it by two. I’m not good at math, but I believe we’d each get more than could fill us in several lifetimes.”

“Yes,” said the other, “but how are we to split it between two when there is very clearly three?”

The leader smiled maliciously at the other. “Let’s see; imagine our young friend gets stabbed in the back? Then we’ll be rid of the third wheel and thus his will be split between us. We’ll be doing him a favor then, being so young… we are his elders; we should have more than he anyway.

“You distract him, play around, and as you do I’ll take my dagger and thrust it in his spine. Follow me and slash his throat and then the gold will be ours to gloat.”

The curtain closed on them and Seth took over. He was seated beside a high school student and leaning back in the seat since it was vacant.

“And plan they did to kill their friend, the moment he returned. But their friend, as sly as he was, has his own plan to be at cause. The gold, he thought, seemed wasted if it was shared. He harbored a hatred and decided the treasure will not get divided. That wanting shine of greed in his eyes led him to the pharmacist so he could be rid of those two buzzing flies.”

The curtain opened and the youngest was standing before a man in a blue robe that was holding a vial.

“I have rats and an old creature that needs handling,” he said. “Poison is what I need to aid me in this situation.”

“Yes, this is the strongest I have, the perfect thing to be rid of any pests within the house. One drop will have him convulsing and soon dead at your feet, and no more rodents you’ll have, so you may finally sleep in peace.”

The curtains closed slowly as the young man was seen adding the poison to two of the wine bottles until it was completely closed.

Seth rose from the seat and made his way back to the stage and up to his stool. He sat down and crossed his arms again.

“Ultimately,” he said as the curtains opened to show a white screen. “The first two continued with their plan to kill the youngest. As they gloated over their treasure won from violence, they drank to their victory and then fell to their demises. The poison had done what it was supposed and ended their lives in convulsions.”

Shadows appeared from behind the screen and went through the actions as Seth narrated them. The first two stabbed the third and continued as he screamed in pain. Seth could see the audience squirm as they heard the sounds of pain and agony. After, the two drank from the contaminated bottles and both cried out once before falling dead on the floor. The screen was pulled up to show the scene from the beginning. Seth got up and walked to the middle of the stage and picked up a hand-full of gold coins and let them slip from his hands to the floor.

“Their actions resulted in their spirits’ expulsions,” he said as the coins clanked on the wood. “And because of their greed, they indeed find Death under the tree.”

The lights went out and the curtain pulled until the sight of the audience was no longer visible to Seth. He turned to the other three as they stood up from their positions and took their places with the rest to bow for the applaud they got from the students.

Once all was calm and the theater empty, Seth sat on the stage and looked at the pile of fake gold. The man who played the leader, John, walked out on stage in his regular clothes and looked at Seth.

“You think we got to them about the greed of wealth?” he asked. Seth only shrugged.

“Maybe,” he said. “But, then again, maybe not. If it did they should figure out a way to handle it in their lives.”

There was quiet between them for a few minutes before John spoke.

“Why did you put this together?”

Seth stared blankly ahead of him as he considered the answer he’d give. “I guess, because I saw it happen with my own eyes. My father gambled all our money away and he was in a large debt. At the time, I was still in middle school and I was studying this piece in my English class.

“When I learned that my college money was taken out of my savings account by my father to pay off his debts, I was so mad. I created a new one and put the rest of my money there away from him. It was when he was recovering when the people he owed a lot of cash to broke in and killed him in our living room. I was in the kitchen at the time and I saw the whole thing.” He turned to look at John. “I don’t want this happening to other people if it hasn’t. They don’t deserve it.”

Without waiting for a reply, Seth moved off stage, John following behind him, and turned out the lights. They needed their rest if they were to re-do this same story the next day for yet more students from other schools.