Board Queen – Part 1
I’ve gotten far less traction for the Answering the Call short story work than I was honestly expecting. I’m still not operating with any true feedback or discussion on my work to date, but the readership for the pieces just hasn’t been up to snuff. I can’t tell if it’s a matter of the story not being engaging, or if the tweets promoting it were sub-par. Maybe I’m being a bit too harsh on myself, I just work with a high standard of accountability, and it feels like these stories haven’t garnered interest. Especially as I start my career, it’s important to learn pretty early on who my target audience is, and then stick within that operating space until I’ve gotten enough success to allow room to maneuver.
I did like how Answering the Call developed. Having the chance to describe a soul as a fantastic and beautiful jewel of exotic design was very fun, and I like the concept of having the ‘hero’ operate under the gun. I’m such a big fan of those sorts of stories, as it lends itself to a natural building of tension as the story evolves. It’s something that the protagonist has to consider with each action, and also something he has to try and outwit. Overall, it’s a very enjoyable chance to build on how the characters emotions will play out under the constant stress of their circumstances. How a character acts as the pressure mounts can engage a reader far more than less drastic settings would. I have more of that story that I wish to tell, but to make sure that I keep things interesting and fresh, I will go ahead and transition to a new story.
My first instinct is to try and reach for a person who interacts very strongly with a VR environment or online persona. Think “Neuromancer” or “Otherworld”. However, that idea has been played out by more experienced writers and the examples above did so in a previous generation. That doesn’t even consider newer books which have taken that concept to a whole new level while I wasn’t even looking. As I don’t necessarily have anything unique at this time to say on that front, I shall instead focus on other avenues of storytelling.
This time, I’d like to try a blending of both Sci-Fi and Fantasy. I have a deep, abiding love of the mix of science and magic. One of my biggest loves in the genre is a video game called Phantasy Star IV. It’s amazing how frequently the art, music, and story of that game has influenced my life over the years. However, it’s hard to make sure that you keep things on a level where your readers can relate to the story being told. With so many avenues open to take both the abilities and the story, I have to make sure that both the Sci-Fi and Fantasy elements still resonate and are distinct. A tricky challenge, but one I feel I am up to.
What I’d really like is for my own ideas to blaze a new trail, which in turn inspires others to write original ideas of their own. It’s a long road to walk, but I want writing to be what defines my life, and in the end I will accept nothing less than my best effort to be put on display. The only left to do then is the only thing that can be done: Write.
For your reading entertainment…
Board Queen – Part 1
Diz had always been different, yet not until today as she sat staring at the cowering elderly woman screaming at her in abject terror, had she felt like she wasn’t human. Diz felt alien, apart from the rest of humanity. She knew that she would never feel like a normal person again. I haven’t even done anything to her, all I did was save her from a horrible death! Diz thought in uneasy and sullen anger. What is screaming at me for?! All she could do was stare at the stricken face of the old lady as she lay in front of her on the slightly dingy plasticrete of the alley.
The poor, rather unexpectedly alive elderly woman was screaming because of how she had been saved. The thought of being crushed beneath an out of control garbage recycling unit had flown completely out of her mind by the appearance of her savior. It’s not every day that a young woman in a canary yellow striped jumpsuit comes hoverboarding in to save the day with a great deal of noise and light. She had hopped off her board directly in front of the thirty ton garbage unit plowing along the plasticrete towards her, and simply raised her hands in the direction of oncoming death. A web of lightning and fire had started between them, and with a howling rush had stretched from her hands to hang from wall to wall across the alleyway.
The netting of fire and lightning had caught the garbage unit head on, and showing no regard for the laws of physics began checking the garbage units progress. The web emitted a shrieking howl as so much weight and momentum tried to break through, and it began glowing brighter and brighter as the truck slowed. All of the lights along the alley walls began to blow one by one, and as each light blew electricity flew from the fixtures into the web. The web grew dimmer and shrieked less as the electricity lent it strength, and the garbage truck slowly came to a stop, it’s front burnt and smoking. The young woman lowered her hands and slowly sank down to sit on the hoverboard she had so recently vacated. The sky blue spikes of her hair bobbed up and down as her head sank between her knees and she gasped for breath. It was in the startling silence of the web dissipating into the nothingness from whence it had sprung that the relative quiet was filled by the old woman’s screams
The recycling unit continued to smolder along the red hot lines burnt into it by the web that had halted its forward progress. The young woman finally broke her gaze from the elderly woman, as the woman had stopped her screaming and was hurriedly scurrying away from her as fast as she possibly could. Her small dog had not stopped yapping since Diz arrived, and even as the dog was dragged away it continued yapping furiously. Leaving does seem like a good idea, Diz thought tiredly as she gathered herself to stand up on her hoverboard once more. SecFirm will be all over this place here in a few minutes. Adjusting the goggles strapped across her face, she finally put her rear foot on the accelerator, blasting forward as she tilted the board upwards. With a whoosh, she shot up and over the front of the recycling unit, reaching out to grab the rear-most antenna before flying off the back of the garbage unit. Using her boards thrusters, Diz swung in a horizontal arc and let go at the exact moment which sent her speeding out onto the lane she had vacated so recently to save the screaming damsel which had caused her such distress.
Why do I keep doing this to myself, she thought furiously as she ducked in and out of traffic, weaving under, over, and between cars as they sped through the various air-lanes. I’ve never felt so feared, as though I were the danger. The look of abject terror and fear that had been directed at her by the old lady kept replaying itself over and over in her mind. She knew that it would be a look that haunted her for some time to come. And yet… You know why you stopped Diz, and you know you’d never do it any other way. She shook her head ruefully as the thought broke through her melancholy. She was right of course, how could she not stop? Growing up on the streets, how many times had she lay awake at night hoping someone would come to save her in her time of need? How many times had she stolen food from the trash of the restaurants as they floated along for other children and gone hungry herself? No, Diz could not have left the woman to her fate, and even the horrified look she had received wouldn’t stop her from doing it again if she had to.
Diz chewed her lip piercing thoughtfully as she always did when something was on her mind. She wove up, down, around, on, and over traffic as she did every day without really thinking about it. Sure, there was almost a hundred feet between her and the ground, but she had been a delivery girl for the last six years. When you spend 14 hours a day riding the air-lanes from the time you were eight onward, you get really good at it. It also helped that she was so short and wiry. She could fit where taller people couldn’t even dream of going, which was why she had been made the youngest business courier at Speedway Inc. When a business needed a physical package delivered, they did not tolerate anything less than perfection. For the money Carl charged them to use Speedway, they got what they wanted.
Carl always turned to Diz for delivery of the high value packages, knowing that the skills which had dazzled him so long ago had done nothing but get better with age. Diz never knew if it was fate or luck that made her go joy-riding on Sven’s brand new, slightly stolen hoverboard right into rush hour traffic at the tender age of eight, but ride she did. Ducking, weaving, looping, and swooping around the press of cars, Diz had been exhilarated and terrified the whole time. After what seemed an eternity she was finally forced to duck into an alley to avoid slamming directly into a particularly expensive looking car. She had survived in traffic for fifteen whole minutes though, three times longer than Sven was always boasting about. Her insides turned to ice as the car she had so artfully dodged followed her into the alley. Nothing good was about to happen to her. She didn’t have any papers because she was an Unwanted, so any run-in with the cops would get her thrown into a boarding school. Worse, it could be someone who worked for Mob Boss Descartes who would make sure she was never seen again. Huddled against a trash can, Diz watched in mounting apprehension as a short, swarthy man with dark hair and an expensive suit got out of the car and looked at her with astonishment. “Little girl” he said with no small amount of wonder “was that your first time on a hoverboard?”
She was clearly not being arrested or kidnapped, so she managed to squeak out a tiny “Yes.” He leaned back against the open door of his car, and stared at her with mounting interest. “Do you have a home little one?” Diz perked up at that; no one really asked her if she had a family, they always just yelled at her and chased her for stealing food and clothes. “No” she replied, slightly more confident about her situation, and she mentally dubbed him “Mr. Man” as he stood there thinking. Mr. Man began drumming his fingers on the top of his expensive car as it sat silently hovering. “Is that your hoverboard?” He inquired rather suddenly, his face calculating as it studied her. “No sir” she replied, rather sheepishly. She had ‘borrowed’ it from Sven, much as Sven had “borrowed” it from the back of that freighter he had somehow managed to hack into.
“Well well” Mr. Man said as his drumming came to a stop. His eyes, sharp and quick as a raven’s, fixed on her with disquieting resolve. “You’ve got a choice to make young one. I could hand you over to SecFirm along with your stolen hoverboard, and they would be only too happy to send you off to boarding school. As that would be a tragic waste of talent, I’m willing to give you a second option: work for me delivering packages. You won’t make much until you prove that you can be reliable, but I would give you a place to stay, food to eat, clothes to wear, and a hoverboard to call your own. I think that’s more than anyone else has ever offered you, yes?” Diz looked at him quizzically, as if she hadn’t heard him right or didn’t quite understood what he was offering. She probed further “So you’re not going to take me to SecFirm? Instead, you want to give me a job? That seems a little shady, Mr. Man. How do I know I can trust you?” Lines of worry appeared on a face which should never have had them as she frowned down at the plasticrete alley, thinking. Suddenly she made up her mind, and brought forth a glowing and winsome smile. “Very well, Mr. Man, I accept. I don’t know what my last name is, but everyone just calls me Diz.”
To be continued…
Hoverboardfully,
Justin
