Week 4 - Objective vs Pancakebrah - P WINS

[Mike Wrecka]

Memo week 4.
Greetings competitors, we move to a fairly standard challenge this week, in response to the number of no-shows and the fact that some people claimed to have struggled with the last challenge. LEGAL LATIN WEEK, you are required to write in response to the short phrase you are given. The Latin thing is just to make it slightly more interesting than a regular phrase. You can treat this writing exercise the same way you would treat writing to a quote topic etc if you want to. Find below your match-ups and specific tasks.

Specific Task - Sub judice

Due date - Wednesday 23:59 PST
Voting Period Ends - Sunday 23:59 PST

Good Luck Objective PancakeBrah

[PancakeBrah]

I'm going to rape you.

[Objective]

I'm going to rape you

Kinky.

[PancakeBrah]

Aspergers (Am I the only one rhyming?)
or, Case #0025616723

"Is this desk mahogany or oak?"
My lawyer ignored it as some misanthropic joke.
"It looks like mahogany."

I noticed how the prosecutor's coffee simmered,
how him and the plaintiff always talked in whispers,
and how awkward whispers sounded in a crowded place.
I saw an e-mail from my lawyer, once, about the case,
saying "This client is off in space, lost in Mars."
But that was ridiculous, if I were cast aloft in stars
I'd die from suffocation, or cold, whichever happened first.
The place was as solemn and serious as hands clasped in church,
and an American flag was perched above a judge who looked like Captain Kirk.
I thought about bringing a fan, just a box type of cage,
so those stars and stripes would wave with the oscillating blades,
because color this Martian as amazed, but nothing's as stupid
as a still hanging flag, jutting from the wall like an ugly protuberance.
I asked the lawyer about the fan, he seemed indifferent.
Maybe more annoyed than indifferent. He dismissed it,
a lot like the mahogany query.

The plaintiff wore a suit, the cuff links a golden rose bouquet,
bursting petals tied in knot, dyed up rot exposed and brazed,
with the initials i.s. etched like some headstone engraved,
and the topmost petals intertwined in cold embrace.
I stared at them for hours. Hours of objections and speeches,
wondering how the smith casted and perfected the creases.
See, each stem matched the bloom above the knotted tie,
and the calligraphy was romantic, above all the dotted i.
He, the plaintiff, Tim? Sure. He would cast disgusted glances,
but they were much prettier to look at than the rusted granite
of the walls, or the linoleum tiles on the floor, patterned in white or black.
I wanted to touch those links, I figured he might retract. So I would fight it back,
the urge, and try to catch the lighting right and bask in their glow.
Honestly, I was in passionate throes. But I suppose that's just how a masochist goes.
I loved those hours, staring at an auric embodiment eloped,
resting opposed at a different desk of mahogany/oak.

--

Prosecutor-
"Where were you the night Isabelle Sumer was murdered?"

I-
"Tim, where did you get those cuff links? No, it's a matter of when.
After she died? A week? After your heart's pitter patter had dimmed?
A piece like that, that takes weeks. It's not like it's casted in tin,
so how long removed from your wife's death did you internally think
'Let's go to the jeweler and get some gold, with her initials in permanent ink?'"

Prosecution-
"Objection. The defendant is not answering the question your honor."

Judge-
"Sustained. The defendant will answer the question or be in contempt of court, considering his prior behavior."

Prosecutor-
"Again, where were you the night Isabelle Sumer was murdered?"

I-
"I was stabbing Isabelle. Repeatedly. Stabbing her, then stabbing her more,
in the back of her car, her spine cracked against the backside passenger door.
I stabbed her stomach, and breast, and ribs, and face,
I stabbed her until the very blush of her cheek drained, every little trace.
She didn't even scream, she just sobbed until it would end,
When I killed her it was so easy I wish I could kill her again.
Her mascara ran dried streams, and her eyelashes were perfectly plucked,
and when her body finally went limp I could embrace her, in a hug.
And although she couldn't breathe, and she ceased to speak,
I swear to God, her heart did one last beat for me.
I want those cuff links, Tim."

--

I enjoy this cell,
although the lawyer is somewhat miffed I didn't just plead guilty.
Miffed might be the wrong word. Overtly aggravated, really.
I suppose I could've avoided Captain Kirk, and ambled awkwardly
to this fate, but those beautiful trappings of sub judice would've been lost to me.

[Objective]

The death of a girl leaves reality hollow and raw,
now a man's facing the judgment of society & law...

(The jury's explenation & how they'll see through the lies:)

Since the day he saw her fit body in the gym and the sexy thighs
he couldn't vizualize existence without her in his life.
As he approached her and tried to act different from the typical guys,
he took notice of the blonde hair that covered her cold blue beautiful eyes.
As she tilted her head in his direction, hair moved away from her face
and completely exposed the facial features of the angel of grace.
He was so mesmerized and stunned at her beauty he left her there guessin',
what could'a been a nice opening line turned to a creepy impression.
Anything else is held out of the confession, but the confederate state;
''The last time they was seen together this moment is believed to be sealing her fate.''
Since he didn't get a date he was determined to follow her home,
and the last witness said it had seen them walking from the gym all alone.
An hour later she was found in a dumpster, a coincidental death?
Well, the autopsy showed that she overdosed on meth.
It doesn't fit her personality and it surprised everyone involved,
she participated in pro-life & anti-drug seminars, a new case to be solved.
Keep lo' and behold, the guy that approached her in the gym just got out of rehab,
went to the gym due to damaged muscle tissue and an injured knee cap.
When asked about a relapse he refused to answer and stared at the wall,
as if life doesn't even matter at all..

(His thoughts and how he experienced the crime:)

The paper holds up until the quoted line,
she was beautiful and sweet, a dime, lovely, destined to shine.
And it was a fact at the time that her voice mesmerized boys,
how she did it is considered a secret throughout Illinois.
But to me she always had a choice, I never offered her meth,
I'll never tell that to the judge, cuz that's a secret to be kept.
I might have seemed careless in the hearing because I overslept,
but her death choked my spirit to the point it's still hard to accept.
It's the other way around, I was the one who had help to offer,
her murder boils down to her sibling, with the brain of a toddler..
After the rehab I knew quite a bit 'bout her godforsaken brother,
So we had silently been exchanging a few words to eachother.
If her parents even bothered they'd see his problems with drugs,
and the ever growing debt he was owing to hardheaded thugs.
He'd been lying and said it was his sister that was buying the shit,
when it caught up with him they threatened that he would get slit.
They had been spying on the kid, but figured it didn't do much,
they wanted to do something that'd leave him scarred but untouched.
We attended the same school, but never hung out so she thought I was lying,
And I felt it was wrong to invade her life as she was on the verge of crying.
So they followed his sister to the gym, where I had been seen,
the reason I avoid the drug test is because I would come clean.
We was supposed to walk home together, but when the plans got destroyed,
I went to the woods by myself to vent and fill the inevitable growing void.
When I got back two hours later I was arrested for the death of this girl,
her mother's a widow too, the truth bout her son would push her out of this world.
So what happened one may ask, I'll anwer your questions;
the thugs realized her brother was broke and wanted to teach him some lessons,
they kidnapped his sister from a van, forced drugs in her system and killed her in seconds.
She wasn't supposed to die, just enough to get hospitalized,
they thought she did drugs so they gave too much for her to survive.
When they realized there'd be involvement from the police,
they planted a witness that lied to the cops and blamed it on me.
Her cousin was in on it too, but he's not to be seen in the court,
I heard from an inmate he went crazy, quit snorting and is picking up sport.
I guess it's the price you pay by coming up short, there's no way to fake it,
God knows why I said it was me; it'd be too much for her mother to take it.
The same message reached her brother, so he's cleaner than ever as well,
but as far as sub judice goes; this is the reason you never know who's going to Hell.
With life as your trial, your soul as your witness and conscience the jury,
think twice before facing the judge whose seen it all and planning the verdict of fury.

[Brian Bryan]

Pancake – Dope, dope verse. Your character building and role-play once you get in the headset of your lead choice has come on leaps and bounds recently, I’ve seen you adopt various different personas well and really flesh them out into fully-fledged mental images. The aspergers sufferer really added an element to this that brought comedy to something dark, really well balanced to strike that between the two and still keep it as believable as you did. The character was relatable too, in an odd sense, which again is kudos to yourself as a writer for bringing colour to him. The Captain Kirk touches were a nice addition, again with the humour, it might light-hearted of dark subject matter in a way that reminded me of Edgar Allen Poe. Heh. The mechanics and scheming in the verse were on point, really helped move it along in terms of flow, but didn’t restrict the story at all which is testament to how solid the writing was. Real impressive verse and creative take this week, Panbruh!

Objective – We’ve collabed in the past but it was a fairly quick turn-around on verses, not had the pleasure of reading much if anything solo by you before, but you definitely went the fuck in this week. I love the word choice and imagery you evoked right throughout this, you tended to not focus so much on the mechanical or technical side and just let the story tell itself with heavy visual imagery and great writers voice, letting it build gradually and evolve of its own accord without ever forcing the issue on the reader. I had a slight issue with the ending but it was a minor thing on my part, on second read everything made sense, really reminded me of Immortal Technique’s ‘Dance With The Devil’ towards the closing section with the mention of the cousins involvement to the crime, maybe it’s just me, but I always keep it one hundred and that’s instantly what it reminded me of as I read it. Two tight verses, opposing verses almost, in that where one had the better technical aspects and mechanics and was more multi-syllable rhyme focused and had great character build-up, the other was matching in terms of wording, imagery, a unique writers voice, and a story that really struck home because it was relatable, real almost, maybe I just been watching too much of The Wire recently haha!

All things considered, with matches like this it seems like a coin flip, but since that’s super-unfair on one guy I’m going with which verse I personally found the more entertaining for whatever individual reason, be that the comedy elements to it striking a cord with me or the technical aspects in so far as the multisyllable rhyme schemes and trickery, but Pancake just had more that I looked for in my own writing than Objective did this week and I found his verse the more enjoyable read of the two as a whole. Therefore he gets my vote, it was an epic though, props to both writers for getting so many lines out in so short a timespan, both deserve two points from this week. Probably BOTW right here before any others have even taken place. Wowzer!



Vote - PancakeBruh

[Pinot Grij]

Wow, insane match-up right here. Both verses entertaining and on some next elvel shit. Kudos to both.

Pancake... I've said it before, but I dig your ability to use subtle touches to inject so much interiority into your character. The Aspergers angle was, I mean, genius. And the ability to carry it out throughout and tie back in things like Captain Kirk and the mohagany/oak thing really made it believable. Here you have this feeble-minded narrator, and when you unleashed the actual killing scene it made it that much more haunting. You have a sick knack to get inside characters' heads and you pulled it off again. Brilliant drop.

Objective, like BB said, you went the fuck in this week.

He was so mesmerized and stunned at her beauty he left her there guessin',
what could'a been a nice opening line turned to a creepy impression.
liked this line, says so much about the interaction without needing to use dialogue. Nicely done. I was really hooked up your story from the mind of your character... how he schemed to do good, but ended up on the wrong end of the stick. I was stuck a little on why the guy admitted to the murder... it didn't seem that realistic to me.

Overall, I just think Pancake had a deeper concept, structure and more complexity.. there was a lot of moving pieces in his drop and they worked together seamlessly. Objective had a dope, solid drop, but Cake had those few extra layers to swing it in his favor.

Vote for Pancake

[Certain]

PancakeBrah: I almost feel like I should avoid voting in your battles because of how much I like and relate to your style. In my time away from rhyming, I half-finished a few short stories and wrote a few essays, and the voice and tone was a lot like your style. I may go back to that voice and tone for a verse or 10 here just because you've proven to me that it does in fact work in rap form. OK, enough dick-sucking. How is "Sumer" pronounced? Is it like "Summer" or like "sumo" with an "er" instead of an "o"? This story was all in the telling. You captured minutiae with precision and the exact state of mind required to properly display your narrator's condition. He was one part Gregory House, one part Hannibal Lector. The testimony from the stand was really great, about as natural as a monologue can get while maintaing a moderately complex rhyme. The rhymes throughout were very strong, which was impressive. And I really liked the tie-in to the topic. This man didn't care about anything except experiencing new things. That's why he killed poor Isabelle Sumer (however it's pronounced), and that's why he refused a plea bargain. So yes, there's the issue that not a whole lot happened in your story. And murder suspects don't really allow themselves to get cross-examined, though I could see this guy convincing his defense attorney that it would be a good idea. Look, the truth is I think this might have topped "GRIZZLY BEARS" as the my favorite verse I've read on this site. It's really nice to see you put it on for this league after weeks of shorter, unfinished products.

Objective: Like PancakeBrah, you hadn't fully impressed me based strictly on your league verses, but your potential was obvious. Unlike PancakeBrah, I hadn't read any open mics or earlier verses from you to give me an inkling of how talented you are until I saw Split Eight rank you fourth in his open mic top 20. Well, I get it now. You told a really great parable-style story here, the type that I think would have translated really well to audio. Your language and use of details don't quite match PancakeBrah's flair for the minutiae but probably is better suited for moving on a traditional story. And I loved the way you took time to get me emotionally invested in multiple characters. That's really important, and you did it well. My biggest criticism comes from the mechanics. Your rhyming felt secondary to the point where lyricism simply wasn't a factor. That's the type of thing that will hurt you when you're going against some of the more polished rhymers who also tell stories well in this league, like PancakeBrah and Pinot Grij. The good news is you can tell a story as well as any of them. The way the details clicked together in your piece was impressive, even if the final sacrifice of taking credit for a crime our narrator could prove he didn't commit seemed a bit stretched. Again, the emotional connection made really paid off by not making me hate that aspect. I liked the take on the topic, in which you criticized the justice system as a whole through this tale. To be honest, this is probably my third-favorite verse of the week. It just happens that you fall behind your opponent (and dead_man, if you're wondering).

Vote: PancakeBrah

[PiE]

Pancake, you're entire verse was excellence. the flow was great fire, the narration was to notch, the character build was so good it pulled me into the story and your details put it all together in great fashion. the character having aspergers made the focus really come to light with the ocd moments in court and that brought a lot of original color to this verse that made it breezy to read and entertaining to follow. your writers voice was educated as well as insane which is always a great mix. needless to say, I enjoyed this.

Objective, your verse was very precise and have the details of a person reviewing the facts of their trail, which was a great aspect in this. gnite had some cool points and some basic ones as well. I thought there could of been more passion expressed in this by a guy who's basically innocent and it's in court about to be presumed guilty. the details of the other characters kind of outshined the details of his innocence, which from a first hand perspective is kinda odd. I liked a lot of this and it read like an episode of law and order. I could even hear the sound effect noise in sequences of the case details... lol. nice verse

Vote Pancake

[Mike Wrecka]

fucking sick battle. botw for sure.

pancake- insane verse. you portrayed a person with autism quite well. its not easy to think like that which is what you have to do in order to create a character with dialogue in a story. that was done very well. the part though, that I was most impressed with, and im not sure if others have touched on this, is the intense detail you went into the courtroom scene. you told about eight lines or so on his lawyers suit. each line intensely descriptive, even down to the stitching. that was awesome. I was fully engaged and invested from start to finish.

objective- sick verse. the story line was good. the first paragraph was really good storytelling. but then you put a twist in it from his perspective. the truth was totally unexpected. to create a plot like that is like a murder mystery detective movie type of scenario. impressive. the flow and word usage was strong. the mechanics in yours may have been a hair above your opponents.

overall- fuck you both for making me decide a winner here. two great verses. I got pancake with votw edging out objective by a nut hair

vote - pancake