Blue Thoughts

The whole bird theme had been a joke, really. Cardinal’s joke, specifically. None of us found it funny, but it’s not like the rest of us had any better ideas. He’d said if we were going to be superheroes, we should stick to a theme, some sort of iconography people could instantly recognize. He settled on the bird idea when he was trying to think of how to fit us into primary colors.

I thought that was really weird, honestly. I vaguely remember from my old comics that hero teams tended to consist of more specialized characters; you’d have your strong guy, your energy guy, your space alien tech guy, your one animal themed character, a wizard, and a mad scientist. Or something like that. And their colors were usually not coordinated, since most teams consisted of people who already had their own solo comics, and thus had their own style independent of the others.

I later found out Cardinal was a huge fan of those goofy Japanese hero-team shows. Still was, even though he was in his mid-thirties. The kind of show where a handful of teenagers all got their powers from sci-fi wristwatches or magic amulets or something. Say a phrase, hit a button, and poof, they’re covered in fabulous spandex and bike helmets, each one a specific color. They’d all have the identical powers of knowing martial artists and shooting laser guns. Also, they had giant robots.

Mystic Missouri

Note: A work in progress, this may be subject to change.

A near-copy of the state of Missouri, which for unknown reasons, got bounced off into its own pocket dimension. In actuality, the state was copied over on a conceptual level, but the original is still back on Earth. Everyone inside the state was likewise copied, as was all flora and fauna. No one on Earth is aware that anything happened at all, while those within the pocket dimension know only that three years ago, the state of Missouri was suddenly sealed off by a mysterious and deadly mist.

The land is accosted by mutants and monsters created by the Mist Wall. However, the rise of superhumans has been a boon to keeping civilization going, both to defend against supernatural threats, as well as provide ways to compensate for the lack of resources and failing technologies.

After the first chaotic year of this event, civilization has stabilized for the most part. The country holds a total population of about 4 million. Unfortunately, the only resources available to the survivors are those that were within the state when the Mist Wall appeared, meaning that resources are now incredibly scarce.

My Process

I am partly an outline-follower, partly a discovery writer, when I’m actually accomplishing anything. I’m very much a start to finish writer. I have sometimes written scenes out of order, but when I do, I usually have to re-write them from scratch when I catch up to them anyway. While I think at heart, being a discovery writer keeps me more engaged on the project, once I know I have something to work with, having some idea of what's happening in the next chapters really helps give me something to kind of guide me so I don’t feel like I’m completely flailing. I don't usually have an exact ending in mind, maybe a vague idea, but it'll come to me as I write and map ahead a bit.

So, the process might go something like this:

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SARAH STRONG #1

Sarah walked down the street, squinting in annoyance against the sunlight. She hated this time of year, with the sun lancing into her eyes from the horizon right as she got off work. Even her sunglasses didn't help. She held up her hand as she...

(Whether I start with an outline or not, I keep the outline beneath the actual text of the story, so I can quickly check on where I'm going.)

SAMPLE OUTLINE

1) Sarah is walking home from work. She cuts through a park. As she does, she sees a group of kids playing baseball. Then, a big thug dude is harassing them. Sarah goes over to stop him, is startled to notice his bestial features, which the kids don't seem to notice. However, once Sarah starts interjecting, other adults come to investigate, and the thug dude runs off.

2) That night, Sarah dreams of seeing a strange wizard-like figure who explains that she is one of those rare humans "sensitive to mystic forces". This enables her to see monsters hidden in the world. The wizard gives her a magic talisman, saying it will give her power. She wakes up and the talisman is there.

3) The next day, walking home again, Sarah is holding the talisman in her pocket. She sees the thug dude again, this time with a small posse. He's harassing the baseball kids again. Sarah goes over to intervene, and she feels the talisman charge her with power. She fights the group, and though the thug dude is strong (he's some kind of ogre-werewolf thing, figure it out later), she is able to punch him clear across the baseball field. The kids help her chase off the posse with their bats.

...

End Issue) Sarah talks to wizard and accepts role as defender of the city. Maybe set up for issue #2?

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So, from there, I start to write. As I write, I might start deviating from what I put in the outline. Maybe I get to the part where she sees the baseball kids. Maybe I decide I really don’t want to bother making named characters out of the kids, and instead, I change her walking through the park to walking through an alley, where she encounters the thug dude almost trying to mug her, only to be interrupted by Sarah ducking back onto the side walk to take the long way home. If that sticks, then I proceed with the outline. I know I want part two to happen pretty much as is, so that stays. Part three, will then end up back in the alley as she tries to re-encounter the monster with her newfound powers. She fights the monster, has a second dream where she affirms her devoting to protecting the city. And that’s pretty much Issue #1 finished, probably too early, but it’s a start.

Alternatively, I stay with Sarah going into the park, and in the process, I name a few of the kid characters and they start having dialogue I find entertaining. Before I know it, I suddenly have a three or four supporting cast that I’m warming up to, so the park seen goes a little long. Part two happens as I wrote. Part three sees more interaction with the kids, and the possibility that there is more going on; after all, why would the werewolf-ogre be after them? Maybe one of the kids is also a mystic-sensitive person, or has a magic device the ogre wants. So I add a few more parts to the outline to figure out where it’s going and keep me on the track. So, Sarah helps the kids beat the monsters, and then the final part happens, Issue #1 wrapped up.

Or I just keep writing and see where it takes me. Maybe as I’m writing the reveal of the werewolf-ogre’s motivation, I hit upon the idea that he’s actually trying to get back something the kid stole, so now the roles are in reverse. Now, suddenly, Sarah has to stop the thief kid before he does something dangerous, the werewolf-ogre is revealed to be a monster hero himself. Maybe the kid gets away, or maybe he doesn’t. From here, the rest of the kids may think of her as an enemy and she has to work to gain their trust, or they think she was in the right, and they become part of her supporting cast, or they have served their purpose and are never seen again. Either way, Werewolf-Ogre is now another supporting character who can become her crime-fighting partner, or just a character who returns on occasion to do something interesting.

Either way, Issue #1 now wraps up here, and further plots to be explored in Issue #2

=======================================================

So, that’s about how my process works. I used to outline the whole issue (referring to this in terms of comic book issues), and change as I went, now I tend to outline three to five chapters, and as the work proceeds, I kind of just let the writing process lead me to discovery. Once I get a few chapters in, I outline a few more chapters, adjusting for new discoveries, and so on, until it’s finished. And, that’s pretty much it!

Toyah

A Mystic Missouri story.

1.1

In the midst of a smashed-flat neighborhood, surrounded the splintered and shattered homes, Toyah hunted for treasure. The little blonde-haired girl in a dirt-brown tunic slowly picked her way down the street. As she shuffled, slid, and skipped around the twisted wrecks of cars and trucks, climbed and jumped over fallen trees, she would occasionally pause and peer at her surroundings. On her shoulder, a small plastic and tin owl likewise swiveled its head, the tiny red beads set in its wide eyes sparking. Despite several stops, neither seemed to find anything interesting. Not until they were three blocks deep into the street did the owl make a fluttering of its plastic wings. The limited movement allowed by the simple hinge was useless for any sort of flight, even if it had been made from the right materials, but its rapid clicking alerted the girl that it had seen something. When she looked at it, the owl turned its tin head so that it’s beak pointed directly at a house three more plots down. The girl hurried over, scrambling over a crumbled brick half-wall, its metal grating lying in a tangled mess among the debris of the neighboring home.

Toyah appraised the building as she approached. Stopping a few feet from where several jagged spears of snapped frame stuck out from a heavy slab of concrete, it was clear there would be no climbing inside herself. She crouched down, noting that the slab and wooden frame slats hung over the ground by about half a foot, cloaking in shadow a broken, ground-level window that no doubt led into the basement. Toyah stood back up and opened the leather satchel she’d been lugging with her. Her fingers touched an object of polished wood, and she pulled out a wooden doll painted like a nutcracker soldier.

Toyah set the little wooden soldier down upon the grass. The red and blue and tan facsimile of a man wobbled for a moment, then righted itself. Its tiny, simple hinges squeaked a bit from long disuse. The young girl pointed forward, towards the massive pile of destroyed wood, brick, and metal. Taking a moment to make sure it had oriented itself, the little toy soldier waddled forward. Its legs were jointed only at the hips, forcing it to walk in a stilted shuffle, especially over the grass. Toyah frowned. This wouldn’t do at all. She picked it back up and inspected the legs. The whole toy was about eight inches tall, as long as her forearm, and the legs were wooden posts twice as thick as her finger. She concentrated for a moment, and the toy vibrated for a few seconds. Then, it went “limp.” The stiff material couldn’t sag, as such, but it’s limbs, which had been resolutely held forward, now dangled towards the ground, as the head turned slightly to the side as if at rest.

Bee-Box

Webfic Challenge: Write something off the cuff for 15 minutes. 

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The bee buzzed through the field, scanning for anything particularly interesting to inspect. Among the purple flowers, it saw the usual sources of pollen and nectar, but in the distance, beyond where its sight could usually stretch, it saw a deep red pulsing.

Ancient instincts stirred in its primitive nervous system. The pulse of light drew it in, a shade of crimson unlike any it had encountered before, were it able to remember. It alighted on the source of the glow, a plastic box that felt strange to its simple senses.

The box buzzed beneath it, a deep hum more felt than heard. In its mind, the bee felt a stirring. Something was forming, a notion, a thought, an idea beyond its simple desire for food and resources. Visions swam before its simple eyes, more complex than anything it had seen before. It had not the capacity to realize that what it saw was not truly there, but uncanny impulses in its mind.

It saw a distance it could not grasp. A field of endless darkness, broken by points of light, some clustered in strange spirals. It saw the growing illumination of one such source of light. As it neared, huge round shapes appeared from the darkness, streaked with all manner of colors, reflecting the shine of the ever growing light. And then, one such shape, blue and green and brown, streaked with white, loomed before it.

The vision continued forward, the new colorful sphere growing and growing as it came ever closer. Soon, it was so large that it engulfed the entire field of view. And as it neared, the darkness broken with specks of light faded away into a deep, glowing blue. Down and down the vision went, towards a patch of green. The color was solid at first, but become more complex as it neared, revealing specks of other colors. The vision flew fast, and the field overcame the vision entirely. The bee, in its limited awareness, understood that the vision had struck the ground.

For the briefest of moments, it was aware. It was aware of the box beyond being just a thing stuck to the ground. It was aware that the ground stretched far longer than it could have ever conceived, if it had even once thought about it. It was aware, suddenly, of what it was, and of the scale of its existence. Beneath it, the box hummed and glowed, and the bee felt itself begin to do something it had never done before. It began to remember…

And then, something cold and wet smacked into its back. Around it, small pattering sounds could be heard. Water. Falling. Rain. The bee flapped its wings in a panic and zipped into the air, knowing it had to find shelter. It would have to return to the… the what? Return? To the hive? No, not the hive, to something… red? Red… flower? Flower. Pollen. Food. No! Wet! Rain! Shelter! Then pollen, then… then it’s train of thought dissolved into the primitive instincts that had guided it and it’s hive all this time.

Behind it, the box’s hum faded to silence. Its glow died to nothing. All was still, save for the rain.

Orb of Power

Webfic Writing Challenge: Flash Fiction involving two friends fighting over an "Orb of Power."

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Two young faces were squished against the glass display case, both wide eyed and gaping. “Holy crud!” said Bryan. “Is that what I think it is?”

“The Orb of Power!” said Krystie. “Only a 1,000 copies were ever printed!”

Before them, resplendent on its little plastic stand, was a single card. Beneath its transparent protective sleeve, the card glistened with a reflective sheen, illuminating the dark purple boarder with highlights of golden shine. On the top half of the card, a picture of an old man in flowing white robes was ringed with a halo of silver reflection, holding aloft a shining bronze orb. Below was a grey box with a simple text: “When the Orb of Power enters the field, all opponents are unable to attack its wielder directly.” Below, more text was italicized: “Even the eternally anguished armies of the Deep Hells could not bare to bring harm to the one who stood in the shadow of the Orb. Its simple radiance held even the most embittered hearts in awe.”

Scrawled across the card was a scribbled autograph, unintelligible to the unlearned, yet instantly recognizable to any half-way dedicated player of the game. Signed by Salvador Amano, creator of The Majestic World Collectable Card Game. The Orb of Power had been released as a bonus at a recent convention, and now fetched unreasonable prices on eBay. To see a physical copy at their very own local comic store set the two kid’s hearts afire.

“DIBS!” cried Krystie.

“Hell no! I saw it first!” said Bryan, scowling.

“Did not!”

“Did so!”

“Did not!”

“Did so!”

“Did not times infinity!”

“Did so times infinity plus one!”

“Your mom times infinity plus infinity!”

Bryan faltered for a second. “That… that doesn’t even make sense!”

But Krystie was already flagging down the shop owner, not waiting to see Bryan’s reaction. “I want the Orb of Power card! Please please please please please I saw it first me me me!”

Old Harold sighed and rolled his eyes, “You kids aren’t even going to be playing that game anymore by next month. How many other cards are collecting dust in your closet?”

“I don’t care, I want it now!” said Krystie, pouting and crossing her arms.

“Hey, man, I saw it first! I want it!”

“Well, I want it more, which is why I got to the owner first.”

“It’s worth at least one hundred dollars, you know,” said Harold. “Collectors item and all that.”

That gave both kids pause. They pulled out their wallets and frowned at their meager ten dollars each. Their parents were not likely to give either of them a sudden ninety dollar allowance increase.

They glanced at the card, crestfallen for a moment, then shrugged. “The Majestic World sucks anyway,” said Bryan.

“Yeah,” said Krystie. “Let’s get some Dark War cards instead!”

“Alright!”

Harold sighed, dragging out the longbox of cards, the poor Orb of Power already forgotten. Kids these days...

Tabitha's Defiance

Webfic Writing Challenge: Write a story using only dialogue, 1000 word limit.

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“Tabitha.”

“Lord Luc.”

“Why are you here?”

“Is it true? All this is just a game? This whole war, these witch hunts, the Final Day? Is it just a game to all of you?”

“…”

“Well?!”

“Tabitha, do you know what eternity is like?”

“What? What does—?”

“It’s agony. The agony of endless ennui. We’ve existed for so long, infinity doesn’t even seem a fitting descriptor. Much of that time, we were insane. There was only us, and the prison that is our universe. It was only when we discovered the means to bend our universe to our whim, that we finally saw the salvation to our pain. For eons, we toyed with the fundement of our prison, until one of us, none remember who, learned how to make worlds. But even that grew dull after a time. It was not until another one of us discovered how to make life, that things finally became truly interesting.”

“So it is all a game. Just entertainment.”

“Yes. And this calamity you wish to stop. The end of the world. It’s just our way of wiping the slate clean, and starting over. All of us gods, we’ll switch roles around. I look forward to playing one of the Tricksters next time. Being the Lord of Justice gets dull after a while.”

“Fifty years. Fifty years, I dedicated to you, Luc. Fifty years I fought against the forces of Savic, believing he was the ultimate evil of the world. But it’s all of you. Millions of people suffering and dying with your names on their lips, and you both, you all, don’t even give it a second thought do you? You’re all just acting. All of us in the world, we’re just your props.”

“Yes.”

“Don’t… I mean you… you create us… you raise us… you develop our worlds… don’t you care? Even a little damned bit?”

“If we didn’t, we wouldn’t do it at all. We’d be making something else. But no game has thrilled us more so than this little role play we’ve devised. Alas no session can last indefinitely, or the boredom eventually sets in again. That’s the worst part of it. No matter how wonderful a creation we make, even something that may enthrall us for a billion eons, it all eventually goes to rust, even our love for it. Nothing, it seems, is truly eternal. Nothing but us, and the horror of infinity ever clawing at the edges of our sanity.”

“…”

“Tabitha, do you understand?”

“How many know?”

“Once every few Cycles one of you finds out. Sometimes they sympathize and accept the inevitable, as we do. Some, however, seek to defy it. But they cannot do what we ourselves are incapable of. Even our greatest creation has never been able to exceed us, and free us from our prison of existence and need.”

“I see.”

“So what will you do, Tabitha? Will you accept your role, as I have accepted mine? Or will you try to do the impossible?”

“…”

“Well?”

“…”

“What’s that you have there, child?”

“You say this universe is your prison. So you’ve never been able to leave?”

“No. We would have, if we could.”

“And nothing has ever come into the universe, from the outside?”

“The many dimensions and planes you know of are our creation. Our definition of ‘universe’ is broader than your own perception.”

“I know what you define as the universe. I’m asking you, have you ever encountered something from outside it?”

“No. What are you getting at child?”

“Do you know what this thing in my hand is?”

“No.”

“You don’t recognize it at all? You can’t just tell, with all your divine intuition?”

“I… cannot… What is that thing?”

“I think, my former Lord, that I know what choice to make.”

“What are you—hrk!”

“I’m going to break your Cycle.”

“I--! What is--what is this--?”

“Eternity’s end.”

“Impossible! Impossi…hck… ch-child… this won’t… stop anything… the Final Day is coming… all you’re… going to do… is prevent the world… from being reborn… hhhhhhh…”

“…”

“…”

“…I know.”