Wednesday's Words on a Friday

 

The original Words for Wednesday was begun by Delores and eventually taken over by a moveable feast of participants when Delores had computer troubles. Sadly, Delores has now closed her blog forever due to other problems.

The aim of the words is to encourage us to write. A story, a poem, whatever comes to mind.

If you are posting an entry on your own blog, please let us know so we can come along to read it and add a few encouraging words.

This month the words/prompts are supplied by Sean Jeating and can be found here

This week's words/prompts are: 

1.hear  2.modern  3.influenza  4.physical  5.organs 

6. original  7.pea  8.human  9.rather  10.size

Charlotte's colour of the month is Pumpkin Orange

Here is my story: Chapter 4 of Jim's Shipwreck:

Within a week, three extremely large tents had been erected in the field closest to the cliff where Jim had fallen into a hole and into a shipwreck. Pumps and fans circulated fresh air as the archaeologists brought in bones and laid them out on the many tables. Jim was under strict instructions to look but not touch, and after putting on a mask, he was allowed into the first tent with Russell Fielding.

“We have determined that all the bones are human,” began Russell, “and by their size we can assume they are male rather than female, given the age of the wreckage it isn’t possible any women were on board.”  “Can we know how many there are?” asked Jim. “As soon as we piece together whole skeletons and don’t have any left over pieces, we’ll know,” said Russell. “For now, we can see the physical appearance of the bones is healthy, no broken bones, no shattered skulls, so it appears there was no fighting amongst them.”

“Something killed them or they just died of starvation then?” asked Jim. “That’s correct,” said Russell, who called over one of the workers to include in the discussion. “Jim, this is Theo Skargill, he’s a trainee Medical Examiner, that’s the person who does autopsies to discover why and how people died.” “How do you do,” said Jim shaking hands as he’d been taught.
“Pleased to meet you Jim,” said Theo, “I hear you’re showing a lot of interest in all of this, do you think you might one day become one of us?”

“I’ve never thought much about what I might do when I’m grown up,” said Jim, “but all of this does look very interesting. Are you able to tell why or how these men died?” “Not yet,” said Theo. “In modern times with recent deaths, we can examine flesh and organs as well as bones, for clues as to what happened. But with bones as old as these, there is nothing left. When people die their organs usually rot away first, then the flesh, leaving just the bones.”

“So cause of death is just speculation?” asked Jim. “Not entirely,” said Theo. “there appears to be no food at all in the wreckage, no evidence of any having been there, so starvation is the most likely cause, rather than maybe a mini epidemic of something. Like influenza, for example.” Russell said,” to know more we need to establish and original time line possibility of when the ship might have entered the cave and how.”

“hmmm,” said Jim, “that’s going to be the tricky part isn’t it.” “Partly," said Russell, "it will hinge on what the ship looked like and what type of wood it was made of.” Theo went back to his table as Russell and Jim wandered off. “I almost forgot,” said Jim. “Nanna said to ask if anyone would like to come up to the house for dinner. She’s making her pea and ham soup and there is always plenty.” “I’ll ask around and let you know,” said Russell.