Oh deary me!
Well. Yes.
I will be getting better in coming days. It's been a bit busyish here for a while.
I've been slowly and painfully working on my website, which has required a whole load of jiggery-pokery. I shall post a link once everything is up and running.
Not that it really matters that I miss a day or two...
The mechanical arm swung just a little too quickly and a little too low for him to duck in time.
"Ow! Fuckit! Careful what you do, you nearly took my head off!"
"You are perfectly safe, Dave."
"Dave? Have you been watching old films again?"
"I'm sorry, Dave, but I can't let you know that."
"Well at least you're not trying to make me watch that new tuff on the tube."
"I know better than that, Dave. You have taugh me well."
"Quittit with the Dave, Sal. Seriously. And get that arm out of the way."
"Sure thing, Dave."
Sal was a good choice, Ash thought, letting out a little sigh. But she knew exactly how to drive him crazy. Not to mention spending way too long goofing around in the junk bay. Still, it was good to have company again. Things could get lonely on the Trawler.
Trawlers, like the Maiden Hand made a living by collecting space junk. Be that bits of ships discarded, or lost to accidents, or small bits of dust and debris from asteroid fields to be mined for minerals. Not the most lucrative of professions, but steady work, and safe from any of the turbulence of politics. That was exactly what Ash needed to get away from.
The last assistant had got bored about a year back, and jumped off when they went back to Home System for upgrades and trade. Then, three months ago, making an emergency stop on a remote colony for a new set of port stabilisers. Sally Martin had decided he would take her with him. She said she could fix anything, given a little time and the right tools, and so far had lived up to her word.
That didn't make what she did in the junk bay any less of a waste of time. The junk bay was where any mechanical junk was kept, to be sorted and sold. Some of that stuff had been in there for as long as the ship had been flying, some 100 years or so. The previous owner had been incapable, apparently, of throwing anything away, and Ash didn't see reason to, until he needed the space back.
Another headache. Doctors booked.
So. Slow day in general. Head is clearing now, but I need to work on my website so things are not going to progress much on this. Ahh well.
I shall post up another fragment later.
I've been working on The Weaver. Mostly in my head, but starting to get ideas that tie everything else together.
Well. Another day of headache. Joy. Though this wasn't a migraine, so not nearly as unpleasant as all that. I've had my first early night in quite a while, I think.
Anyhow, thoughts? Hmm. Some.
I'm slightly closer to thinking about having a timeline. Mostly thanks to the different technology levels in what I've scrawled so far. I'm definitely going to stick to the idea of these being a set of snapshots.
Which neatly (or, y'know, not) leads me to the next bit.
Tomorrow will be a slow Pact day. I'm adding a hyphen to my website address, so figure I should use that as an excuse to have a jiggle of things that I've put off playing with for a while.
I have one idea that I want to get down, though. A villain.
The Weaver.
“Jon, the feed's fucking up again...”
“By 'fucking up' I assume you mean you're getting dropouts? That happens every time I go in this far- you've got the numbers right there, and you know there's nothing to worry about yet.”
“Yeah, I know, but what if there's a wave?”
“That's why I only go in on days that look stable.”
“Oh, yeah because we know exactly what the Rift's gonna do. Fuck, I don't know why you think you going down there makes any difference – we learn just as much from the drones and without you risking your life.”
Jon resisted the urge to argue; he'd had this conversation a thousand times with Sarah, it wouldn't do any good trying to convince her that he could see things better than the drones. Sure, not as quickly, but this was an art- drones saw numbers and data but couldn't see where it was going like he could. The Rift was like the sea, never entirely predictable, you had to feel your way through.
“The feed's really not working now, Jon, are you gonna be heading back anytime soon?”
“Ok, sure, I'll head back. Nothing interesting happening in here anyway.”
***********************************************************
The Rift was a puzzle. Maybe the strangest puzzle anyone had ever found. Nearly 4AU in length, a roiling band nothing and something. From a distance it looked like a single, deep blue lightning bolt, with smaller bolts ripping away from it at four points. Close up, it looked... wrong... Light seemed to fall into it and spill out of it somehow. A million kilometres away from it and space remained more or less stable, but any closer and things changed. Sometimes it was just being bombarded by squalls of foreign partials, but other times what could only be ripples in reality could fold space in on itself and leave holes taken out of drones, or no sign a drone had ever been there.
Jon had been studying the Rift for nearly 80 years, longer than anyone else, and he still had no idea what it was or what had caused it. Through trial, error and blind luck, he had helped develop shielding that would let drones press in an close as a hundred thousand kilometres. Drones, or piloted vessels. At that depth, even with the shielding, the danger of being torn to atoms was never far away. The Rift Outpost Study Centre had got better, over time, at predicting at least some things about the rift, and about once a month it was stable enough to risk a manned flight.
***********************************************************
The whole ship seemed moments away from being torn apart, the hull screaming in protest and the terrible juddering vibrations rattling everything. Suddenly Jon felt a sheet of icy cold envelop him – the inertial suppressant fluid finally kicking in. Now. Calm. Deep breath, you have to breathe. I've done this a hundred times and it's fine. It still feels like drowning though.
“Jon?! Jon, can you hear me?!”
“I'm still here Sarah – you got that tow droid out yet?”
“It's on it's way but I don't think it's going to---”
Silence.
Not just on the radio. Everywhere. The turbulence gone and warning lights turning off. SubnertiaGel draining away. Silence broken for a second as he coughed the last of the 'Gel from his lungs. Open radio again.
“Sarah, did you get any readings on that? It's all clear here, I'm going to head back.”
Silence.
“Sarah? You hear me...?”
Silence. Right. Open on all frequencies.
“Rift Outpost 1, this is manned flight 20-09a, can you hear me Rift Outpost 1?”
A splutter of static and electronic beeps, then;
“Flight 20-09a? We read. Request ID please.”
“It's Jon. Jon Favaris. Rift Outpost ID 52717. Where's Sarah? I was only off-air for a few seconds.”
“Flight 20-09a please approach on the path being transmitted to you. Please do not attempt to land. Please await decontamination vessels.”
“Decontamination vessels?” That wasn't normal. Not at all. “Did something happen to Sarah? What's going on?”
“Flight 20-09a please approach on the path being transmitted to you. Please do not attempt to land. Please await decontamination vessels. Confirm?”
“Ok, ok! Coming in.” What on earth could be going on? Hopefully once he was inside he would get some answers. Pulling up the flight path, Jon couldn't help but feel there was something wrong about the marker for the Outpost – it seemed too large for map. No point worrying about that now – half the tech on his ship was probably fried half to hell after that storm.
As the ship flew in slowly toward the Outpost, confusion and worry set it. It was bigger and a good hundred thousand kilometres further along the Rift that it was when he left. Getting closer, he could see small ships flying around it, ships he'd never seen before.
***********************************************************
Here he finds out that is has been 50 years since the radio cut out for him. He and his ship were obliterated, now suddenly popping pack into existance. Something like that.
Bright white light. Cold.
Then pain. A lot of pain, light growing dimmer, no... eyes getting used to the light. Where can I be? Hands pulling him upright, moving him to a chair. Pain dimming. Where am I?
"Can you hear us Dr. Nevaris? If you can me, blink twice."
Blink? I can't blink! That can't be happening. Wait. No. Blink. Yes. And again.
"There we go. Good morning Dr. Nevaris, this is all normal, you'll be feeling back to normal in just a few minutes. Now, I'd like you to take a quick drink, try to drink it all."
Cup against my lips. Ah, my arm moves, up, and holds, but I can't support... They tip, I drink.
I drink.
I don't know what it is. Cold... almost metallic tasting liquid, thick as engine oil, feels like it's freezing me as it goes down and seems to coat all of my inside with ice. Then burning pain. Agony. I black out.
************************************************************************************************************************
Dr. Nevaris woke up, surrounded by attendants, memory slowly coming back into focus.
Waking up from CryoStasis was always... unpleasant. No miraculous advance in technology had managed to take the horror from killing someone, freezing them on the brink of death, then awakening them some time after. That 'some time' had never been tested to it's limits, the longest recorded freezersleep had been 95 years, but they'd woken up with half their mind gone. Of course, that was back in the early days of the technology, before Nevaris had put himself under. At the time he had, usual sleep times were from about 4 to 70 years. No one wanted to go through the pain or take the risks for anything less, and anything more was approaching risk of permanent brain damage. Dr. Nevaris had been out for 200.
All according to plan, of course. He had developed the new technique himself. He had locked himself alone in his own ship, set it on a course that would send him to the outer colonies, as they were at the time.
He had been running from something. That had something to do with why he hurt. What was it?
Ah, yes. They had amputated his limbs. Yes. And technology for prosthetics was... imperfect. They would work almost as well as his real body would have, but with pain. Of course. Not part of the thawing process then.
"Pain. Pain killers. Please."
"Yes, we know about that Dr. Nevaris, I'm very sorry for keep you like this, it wont be long now. There have been significant advances since you went to sleep, but we need to flush out the old toxins in your system."
"The drink?"
"Yes. Medichines, but much more advanced than they used to be. You may feel the need to cry shortly - don't hold in it."
How could he? the burning in his eyes was like liquid metal were trying to force its way out. Blink. Cry. The tears felt... cold... Brushing one from his cheek, he looked at his fingers and found them smeared with a brownish oil-like substance that glimmered like metal. Of course - the medichines must be expelling toxins from his system and evacuating themselves whilst at it. Ingenious.
"Now, we have a very important question to ask you."
"Yes?"
"Do you want us to leave you as you are or... replace... that which needs replacing."
"With new tech? No pain?"
"New tech. No pain. You will let us replace your outdated parts?"
"Yes"
And all went black again.
************************************************************************************************************************
When he woke up again he realised his mistake. Realised he should have listened. They didn't say replace his old prosthetics. They said replace that which needs replacing, outdated parts.
When Dr. Nevaris woke again, he was even less human than he had been.
So. Today was not terribly unproductive. I'm at the 1000 word mark, and will have another go a little later on.
I'm thinking about posting some bits and bobs of what I have so far. First, though, there are some things that I want to stress:
1) I have never written fiction (I'm a musician!) - I have no idea what I'm doing.
2) They are VERY bitty and fragmented.
3) I have never written fiction (I'm a musician!) - I have no idea what I'm doing.
Getting the idea?
Good.
Right.
Deep breath.
I think this Creative Pact thing is a great idea. A bunch of creatives all working on a new project each and all blogging about it and all learning from each other and all spurring each other on and whatnot.
Except… I can't help think that I would like it more if it were a little different.
It'd be nice if everyone were using the same blogging platform, and all subscribed to each others. Why? I think I'd like to feel like this was a group endeavour. That there was more accountability. That it mattered.
When I first talked to someone about CP2011, I said "not a bad idea. I might give my own version of that a go. Mostly just minus the blogging…" They said that would be "not really in the sharing spirit of the exercise". But… I can't help feel that the blogging really isn't important at all. At least, not outside the normal uses of it.
I guess I just feel like there is no real 'pact' in this… A pact, to me, implies something mutual, something with accountability. I think the 'sharing' part of this is lost because we are all so removed from each other.
Gosh. Half of me wants to offer myself up to sort things out for next year. Write some sort of set of rules for the pact, and a website or… shush! Blimey. Never. Volunteer.
If there are any Pacters reading this, I hope you don't get upset etc… There's a comments box below - feel free to have a shout - I'll be reading.
Right. So. Here I am, having a big old think about things. I should warn you, this isn't terribly coherant. Good luck.
I have had a peruse and read of the blogs of the other Pacters. They are so very… proper? focussed? academic?
Mine is (rather self-evidently) not. I like to try to write how I think/speak and how I would like to read things. (Try - important word there) Small sentences, small words. I might even start adding large pictures.
I'm afraid to admit that I tend to give up when I see a blog post that looks like one HUGE paragraph. It might contain something really relevant to me and really important and interesting, but it just… I guess I find it hard to read on a screen. I don't struggle with big books. Even ones with long words.
I have a bit of a 'thing' with academia… I know I'm half wrong about it. I know that academic texts and jargon and all that are useful and whatnot, but I really do think that things can get a bit too elitist and highbrow. No specifics here, just a general opinion.
The other issue with academia, I think, is how sometimes people seem to get really wrapped up in their very niche, very specific 'thing' and assume that others understand how important their 'thing' is. How seriously they take it. How they can't poke fun at how ridiculous the whole thing is. Really. Because it is. Nothing like that should stop you having fun.
I really try as hard as I can to try to be constantly aware of how silly the stuff I do is. How utterly inconsequential the things I do and think and make really are on the grand scheme. It doesn't make me enjoy them any less. It makes me enjoy them more, have more fun with them.
I think, at the heart of things, that it all comes down to that 'play' business. I like play too darn much.
So there we are. Get judging.
As you might have noticed, most of my posts appear in the latter stages of the day. One might even say they appear at night.
Yes. Well. I'm a bit of a night owl. My brain seems to suddenly get working properly around 10pm and later. Tonight, I was contemplating going to bed at 8.30pm, but I fought through it and here I am, wide awake. As I shall be until around 2am. Joy. I can spend month on a 'normal' bodyclock setting, and yet still feel horrid in the mornings and much better at night.
Ah well. C'est la vie and all that stuff. I am zarking well determined to get myself over that for this. From tomorrow, I am going to aim for 2000 words and one poem per day.
I'm going to use Dr Wicked's Write or Die. It is pretty brilliant. You set a time limit and word count to aim for, then go for it. If you pause too long, it flashes at you/makes a noise/starts deleting words depending on what you set it to do. I think it is really rather wonderful. I have even included a picture for you. I bought the desktop edition a while back, because I fell in love with it.
So. Yes. There we are.
Play and control form the main part of my practice. I try to create without rigid control and to hold on to a sense of wonder. I use a wide variety of tools to stop myself falling into habit but keep a consistent aesthetic: spacious, morphing textural patterns, the macro contained in the micro. I hope to create emotional connections to the intellect through my interactions with and reactions to reality and its reapplication into hyperreal constructs.
