Lost Words

Posted by natechen on

About four or five years ago I discovered the SCP Archives, a fascinating collection of short stories in the “creepy pasta” genre. The SCP Archives are “found document” stories, framed as a series of procedures, bureaucratic files and research notes that compose the history of a single paranormal or preternatural person, place or thing. They’re full of inventive ideas, people and terms. While the SCP Archives themselves were never something I really wanted to write in the idea of a set of found documents that contained the pieces of a story but unspooled them in a nontraditional way. It took a long time but eventually “Lost Words” became the first result.

We’ve been working on decoding the information on the artifact for the last sixteen years, since we pulled it out of Saturn’s rings. We’re not sure how long it was sitting there, playing dead among the debris and we may never be certain. Frankly, it’s a miracle it’s still in one piece.

What we do know for sure is that it is electronic and has something like an onboard computer although we haven’t been able to make much of it. Here’s what we’ve got, along with notes from the researchers.

INITIATING DATA RETRIEVAL…

FILES 82% CORRUPTED

ATTEMPTING FILE REPAIR…

10% SUCCESSFUL

RECONSTRUCTED DATA WILL BE DISPLAYED [IN BRACKETS]

INITIATING DATA PLAYBACK…

The data retrieval and file repairs are things referenced in the artifact’s onboard memory, not something we did when we got it back to Earth. We find it unlikely we will ever be able to repair or replace any of the data lost.

SI[TUATION] REPORT: Drop Sphere 3

REPORTIN[G OFFI]CER: Te[data lost]

STAR SYSTEM: [data lost] 5 Phase 2 Star

Coordinates: 322.[data lost] off Galactic Plane

PLANETARY SURVEY: Tertiary Planet

Typology: Nickle-Iron Core

Oxygen-Ni[trogen] Atmosphere

2/1 Ocean/Landmass Ratio

Satellites: [data lost]

It’s unclear what kind of coordinate system the artifact uses, or what kind of Galactic Plane they’re referencing. Based on the information available, the logical conclusion is that they’re referring to Earth although we find that eventuality unlikely for reasons that will become clear.

INITIAL SURVEY:

Chronomark – 928.4482.4

Multiple settlements confirmed on each continent. Civilization’s power distribution network consistent with a Type 2 Industrial society. Multiple orbi[tal structures] detected, suggesting the native population has been making [data lost] for some time. Survey of outlying planets did not reveal signs of permanent settlements on outward planets. Conditions on [inward pl]anets do not appear hospitable to life. Further information in fu[ture surveys.]

We conclude that the native species is most likely confined to this planet at this time.

[data lost]

The onboard records suggest that the bulk of the lost data in the artifact’s files were lost here. Roughly 40% of the data the artifact was trying to receive was from this chunk of lost files, which suggests that they spent a lot of time surveying the planet. What’s particularly interesting is that the context around the missing data suggests the missing information was entirely about the population and civilization on the planet’s surface.

Unclear how many sapient species are native to the planet. Initial scans show no signs of coherent architectural [themes] computer analysis cannot determine if differences are wide enough to suggest a differences in species. Communications [data lost] have not yet been deciphered.

Planet shows typical biodiversity for a Type 2 or Type 3 Industrial society. Standard sapience development studies show they should have larger settlements in the oceans suggesting the entire population may be mildly thassalophobic. Further details will [require closing to] close orbit.

The idea that a civilization is thassalophobic just because they don’t settle their oceans is interesting, particularly given things we will see later.

Chronomark – 928.4482.6

I have submitted a request to remain in high orbit. The stories about first contact with Type 2 and Type 3 societies are nightmares. [data lost]

It would be nice to know what kinds of things the Sphere commander was worried about but whatever it was seems lost to time.

COMMAND DIRECTIVE

OBSERVATIONAL COMMAND

Issued: 4th Fleet [data lost]

Recipient: [data lost]

Chronomark – 928.4484.3

Commander,

Your objections to further surveillance are n[oted and show a comm]endable consideration for your crew and ship. We hereby override them. Deploy a communications relay and keep it updated in accordance with Hazardous Contact Protocols then approach to a [data lost]

You’re out there to detect potential threats to the Commonwealth, Commander. Do you job.

It’s interesting that whatever Observational Command was, they had protocol for these kinds of situations but still managed to lose the artifact – which appears to be a communications relay based on what we’ve learned – in spite of the protocols they put in place. What happened here was apparently well outside their expectations.

DETAILED SURVEY:

Chronomark – 928.4484.5

Our sphere has begun braking orbit, we are [data lost] and proceeding under Hazardous Contact Protocols. Our attempts to break the native communication codec is still [underway]. Fortunately we’ve discovered a series of analog broad[casts that appear to be unfiltered] audio and we’re working on translating the language. So far it seems we’ve avoided detection by the natives.

Several of the major structures have been firmly identified as orbital telescopes.

[data lost]

This is another major section of lost data – it represents about 12% of the lost data and presumably describes more of the planet’s orbital technology.

We believe the largest to be some kind of orbital space station, although what purpose the station serves is unclear. It’s not attached to a space elevator nor do we see large space vessels under [construction.] We’re adjusting our approach to avoid visual dete[ction by these install]ations.

So far we only have one new significant piece of information. Our analysis of the audio from the planet suggests only a single species lives there as the phonemes we’re detecting are all similar enough to come from a single type of [vocalization organ.] Based on what we know of the galaxy, that suggests a single sapient species is producing them.

[data lost]

At this point most of the missing data is accounted for. From the corrupted data on hand my analysts suggest at least part of the analog audio the drop sphere recorded was stored here. It’s possible we can still make something out of that and learn something.

[Chronomark] – 928.4484.6

[data lost] approaching standard orbit, two tanks compromised.

Definitely not a space station. What we thought were [just] telescopes do double duty as gathering arrays that focus [data lost].

The station then serves as a focal point for the weapon. Primary habitation module was compromised. Casualty list is attached:

[data lost]

– and I doubt our hull will stand up to the strain. Against the better judgment of my officers, I’m ordering us to abandon ship. We’ll keep in touch with the comm relay in accordance with Hazardous [Contact Protocols] but [data lost]

May heaven have mercy on us.

The reference to heaven is heavily debated by the translators. Most of them think we’re projecting our own culture on the aliens and worry we’re dumping a lot of cultural baggage onto this part of the records where it’s inappropriate. I’ve chosen to leave it in place for reasons you’ll see shortly.

Chronomark – 928[data lost]

Drop Sphere 3 has been abandoned. Find rest in the silence of space, old friend.

We’ve launched both of the sphere’s life pods and are making for the [data lost]

Current crew compliment of this pod [data lost] for a total of five survivors.

Five survivors in one pod led to a lot of speculation on the sphere’s original crew count. Since it’s a very small data point to draw any kind of conclusion on I eventually stepped in to end the discussion and removed that debate. Interested parties can pull the detailed files from the project archive if they’re really dedicated to reopening the issue.

Chronomark – 928.4486.1

In spite of maneuvering at minimal thrust for the past thirty hours [data lost]

The telescope is im[possible to] shake. We’ve raised our acceleration to the maximum safe rate and are maneuvering towards the system’s fifth planet, a gas giant with [data lost]. Hopefully the [local sapiens] conclude we’re trying to shelter there. In truth, I just hope we distract them from [data lost]

We’re not sure what the sphere commander was hoping to distract them from but our consensus supposition is they were trying to keep the planet’s telescopes from picking up their communication relay.

Chronomark – 928.4486.4

It seems [data lost] and salvaged some of the data we’d collected before our Drop Sphere was destroyed. I’ve assigned my team to work on analyzing it to keep them busy while [data lost.] I’ve told them maybe we’ll learn something that will help us survive, although privately I’m not optimistic on that front.

Pretty industrious people in that pod.

Chronomark – 928.4487.3

They scrambled a pursuit ship incredibly quickly. As near as we can tell it’s a [chemically pro]pelled ballistic ship, which is shockingly primitive compared to [data lost]. Even so, it’s closing fast enough to be here in three days. Things have been tense. Morale is dropping quickly and I have to admit that I don’t think we have any way to avoid [capture].

Given how vicious the [data lost] avoided at all costs. We will continue to report what we learn from our scanning and analysis.

Chemically propelled ballistic ships are shockingly primitive compared to their drop sphere but somehow they still managed to destroy it. I’m not sure what bothers me more. That they think our level of technology is primitive, or that they still got destroyed somehow.

We’re still not sure what the artifact’s Chronomarking system means, but given the pretty clear timeline laid out in these last few entries we’re optimistic we can crack them eventually.

Chronomark – 928.4487.8

A potential breakthrough, although [data lost].

The value of that analytical method is questionable but I’m operating on the premise the results are reliable. It’s the only thing with the potential to improve our sit[uation] anyway. [data lost]

We’re monitoring their communications now. We hoped that would help us evade pursuit but the new codec isn’t helping us since we still haven’t translated their language. [data lost] … understanding of basic machine commands based on what we’re seeing but that’s it for now.

We’re not sure how they cracked a communication codec without knowing the language it contained. Perhaps in one of the lost data sets they translated an analog audio segment and used it as confirmation. We don’t know.

Chronomark – 928.4488.6

We’re testing the new codec against their voice transmissions. It’s interesting because, even though we can’t understand them, we’re all able to mimic all the sounds we’re hearing. I’m starting to think that [data lost]

I think at this point the people in that pod were starting to suspect. That’s why they’re testing all the language they were hearing.

Chronomark – 928.4489.1

The alien ship is getting very close, close enough that we can make visual contact with it. We expect it to match velocity with us in four hours. After some debate, I’ve issued sidearms to all survivors on board. There’s already joking about saving a bullet for ourselves, which is an accurate reflection on the current state of our morale.

[data lost] and transmitted it. If the alien ship has any idea what we said or that we were talking to them they haven’t given any sign of it.

Too bad we don’t have the other ship’s records to tell us how they reacted to this.

Chronomark – 928.4489.4

The alien ship has launched some kind of grapplers and drawn us into contact. I will try and record as much of our encounter with them [data lost]

… some kind of diamond tipped drill to pierce the hull before establishing a seal and moving their personnel over. We’re bracing for their entry.

[data lost]

… fallen back and are regrouping. I don’t think they were expecting resistance. Frankly I’m surprised, too. We’re scientists here, not fighters, but [data lost]

We’ve got just enough time to pull the helmet off one and – my god, they’re human. They’re human just like us. That’s not possible. If anyone reads these logs [data lost]

END PLAYBACK

When we reached this point we were extremely confused. The translators went over this dozens of times, we’re almost 100% certain whoever created this log found creatures like themselves on a planet they were totally unfamiliar with. Whether they were actually a human civilization that discovered another human civilization where they shouldn’t have is open for debate.

Did the artifact arrive here through some method of time travel? Is it a very elaborate, very expensive hoax created by one of the billionaires playing with space flight? Did the artifact just drift into the solar system after it was lost countless eons ago? We don’t know.

I would love to be able to confirm one of those theories. It would remove the possibility that some other human civilization on Earth rose up, took to space and had an encounter with an even older, more advanced human civilization from far flung stars only to vanish for reasons unknown. What does that say about what’s waiting for us out there, if it’s true? And what will we do about it?

For now, I’m proposing we head back out to Saturn immediately and begin looking for other pieces of technology comparable to the artifact. Hopefully we can learn more before it’s too late.

Advertisement

Cold Iron – A Vince Porter Exorcism

Posted by natechen on

Hello folks, Nate here! It’s the beginning of a short fiction extravaganza! Of late I’ve been contributing to ironage.media on a semiregular basis. There’s little to no direct crossover between my audience here, which I built long before contributing there, and the readership of that website (although I strongly recommend giving it a look if you enjoy independent scifi and fantasy.) With that in mind, I want to share some of the stories I wrote for IAM with you!

We’ll be running through a bunch of stories over the next few weeks and I’ll do a short introduction before most of them. Vince Porter is a character that came out of nowhere in response to IAM’s weekly prompt. I’ve always found the way exorcists are portrayed in fiction kind of strange and I decided to boil down most of my ideas into a single story. This is the result. Will we seen Vince doing battle with supernatural evil ever again?

Maybe. In the mean time, I hope you enjoy this quick outing with a part-time exorcist.

“Run through it again, Porter,” the voice in his ear said.

Vince Porter worked his fingers into his thick gloves as he started. “Appearances began two years ago. The creature only appears in the winter months when the temperature is five degrees Celsius or less and always rides from the northern ridge down to the river before vanishing. I’ll intercept it along the embankment by the river and assess it.”

“Remember that we’re not sure it’s a demon.” Remi’s manicured nails clicking away on her keyboard were clearly audible over her headset pickups. “It could be a bunch of other things. If it isn’t a demon your involvement ends immediately.”

“Sure.” Vince worked his toes down into his boots while adjusting the double cuff on his snow pants so it sealed off the tops better. “I leave right away.”

“I’m serious, Vince, you’re a pastor and addiction counselor, not a paranormal expert. Leave the jackalopes to professionals.”

“The reports say its a man on a horse who seems to draw a snowstorm behind him, that’s a far cry from a jackalope.” He adjusted his utility belt, his fingers drifting along the wooden stakes and silver plated knife he’d brought along, just in case. Vince had never fought a vampire or werewolf. However all the things he’d heard from Remi and the others suggested they were out there and he liked to be prepared. “If the retreat wanted a full service exorcist they could’ve asked the Vatican.”

“The papists have their hands full with all the possessed Catholics, they don’t have time for us Protestant filth.” Remi said it lightly, although he knew she resented most of the Orthodox for her own reasons. “Besides, I don’t think they’d prioritize a creature that’s ignored people so far.”

The belt slipped awkwardly along the top of his parka and clothing. Vince had heard this was why layers of cotton or wool were preferable for cold weather exorcisms, rather than synthetic fabrics. Regardless of whether that was true he didn’t have the budget for a specific set of gear for every kind of weather. He’d have to make do with his skiing clothes. “If it is a demon I need to know the name of its victim. Any leads from missing persons cases in the area?”

“You’re in a ski resort, Vince, do you really think anyone could go missing there without it causing a multi week news blitz? Even you couldn’t miss that.”

“I don’t know, we don’t watch a whole lot of news at the recovery center. It pushes the guys back towards the drugs.” He finally reached the large, heavy sheath that was secured via a special set of metal rings to his belt. It held his sword, a nasty weapon with a forty inch blade made of solid iron. A wiggle of the hilt assured him it was loose in its sheath and ready to draw at a moment’s notice. “Are you saying no one went missing in the area two years ago?”

“No one was reported, at least.” Remi clicked her tongue once. “You know most of the people in the area who have gone missing or are most likely to go missing, did you ask any of them whether they knew people who went missing in the area?”

“Homeless people and addicts generally don’t live this far out of the city center,” Vince replied. “Too hard to get to services here. Come on, Remi, you’re supposed to be really good at connecting the right talent to with the right job, you have to have some kind of lead on who the demon’s possessing or you wouldn’t have called in an exorcist. You’d have gone straight to a paranormal researcher.”

“I haven’t had time to confirm anything…”

“I preemptively agree to all your caveats, Remi. Tell me what you got.”

“A cavalry patrol on a training exercise disappeared in a blizzard during World War One. For a couple of years after there were stories of a rider appearing in a cloud of sleet during the winter months but there were no sightings for decades after. It’s cropped up a few times in the past century, always just before an armed conflict, most recently Operation Desert Storm.” Remi recited the facts in a brisk, straightforward manner but there was a tinge of excitement underneath them, as if she reveled in knowing something he didn’t. “I think it’s possible your demon possessed one of the original cavalrymen.”

“Raises the question why it’s back now,” Vince mused. “We’re not at war.”

“Yet.”

“Thanks for that lovely thought to haunt my dreams tonight.” He tugged his parka’s hood down over his head and pulled the laces so it fit snug around his face then climbed up to lay prone on the embankment, binoculars trained up the slope. “What were the names of the soldiers who went missing?”

“Lieutenant Braxton Thorton, Corporal Cole Emmery, Privates George Thurgood and Terrance Norton. I couldn’t find much more in the way of records, so you’ll have to try them all.”

“Thanks, Remi. That’s a big help.” A low cloud rising like steam over the mountainside drew Vince’s attention. “I have contact. Give me two second pings, please.”

A low tone began sounding softly in his earpiece. “Are there any cases of demons not disrupting phone calls?”

“Not that I’ve heard of.” Vince took a mallet and carefully drove an anchor stake into the river embankment below him then readied a heavily modified T-shirt launcher. “Unfortunately it’s not an ironclad diagnostic tool, either. Lots of supernatural stuff causes problems with phones and computers but it’s a simple enough starting point. If we lose contact wait an hour or so before you call in the cavalry.”

“An hour? That’s a long time for your dead ass to be freezing on the mountain.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence. Wait an hour, Remi, if it is a demon then my phone is shot and I’ll need to hike all the way back to the visitor’s center before I can contact you. I’d hate to have the cops get out here at just the moment I stagger back into the lodge.”

“Fine. You have sixty minutes from the moment I-”

Her voice cut off. Vince sighed and started counting minutes in his head while watching the strange cloud of snow as it closed at an unsettling speed. By his estimate the approaching storm cloud was about forty feet wide. However trailing along behind the unnaturally concentrated front was a larger wall of snow and wind working its way down the mountain. The whole of the foothills glittered with moonlight reflecting on the flakes.

Vince fumbled with his hood for a moment, cursing his gloves as he got the earpiece out and clumsily shoved it into a zippered pocket. By the time he was done with that he could hear the dim echoes of hoof beats over the muffling effect of the snow. Pulling ski goggles over his eyes with one hand, cradling the T-shirt gun in the other, he stepped into the storm.

The wall of white cut off the outside world immediately. Vince took a deep breath in through his nose but no smell of sulfur was on the wind. All he got for his trouble was a numbed nose. The air had abruptly gone from damp and cold to bitterly cold and dry as dust. Sleet and snow buffeted against his parka. The hoof beats grew closer and a strange trepidation built in him with each thundering footfall of the unseen horse.

Something evil was coming.

“Terrance Norton!” Vince called, his voice booming over the silencing snow and horrible hooves. “You did not choose me, but I have called you!”

Somewhere out in the storm the horse came to a sudden stop. Vince waited, hoping for a sign, but nothing else happened for a good fifteen seconds. Either he wasn’t actually dealing with a demon or the possessed person from the army patrol wasn’t Norton, else that challenge would have forced the fallen one to respond. Well, there was a response. The sense of supernatural danger grew stronger and that was nothing to sneeze at. But it wasn’t the response he should get if he’d properly challenged the demon, if it was actually a demon.

Not for the first time, Vince cursed all the unknowns that came with demon slaying for a side gig. It would be nice if demons had clear cut tendencies and typologies, like in movies. But eight years of experience had taught him that the supernatural had so many tools at their disposal a human, with all the attendant limits to awareness and agency, couldn’t really predict their actions. An exorcist had to counter the demon on the human level, not the supernatural one.

“George Thur-” A creature on horseback thundered out of the snow, a steel helmet pulled low on its brow, red eyes peering out from underneath, stringy white hair flying along behind it. It was wrapped in tattered old rags. If the creature had been in a uniform before it was long lost to time and wear and all that remained was its helmet. The horse had a touch of the uncanny about it as well. It’s mane was just as white as the creature’s hair and it’s hooves seemed to never touch the ground.

It appeared out of nowhere and bowled Vince off of his feet, sending him stumbling back into the embankment. For a brief moment he wondered if this wasn’t a demon after all. Perhaps he’d stumbled on a horse from a fairy world or a snow elemental who’s visits to the mountain just so happened to line up with the outbreaks of wars. Then the creature shrieked and a wave of brimstone scented air washed over him. Definitely a demon.

The horse reared and tried to trample Vince beneath its hooves but he dragged himself out of the way by pulling on the cord he’d driven into the embankment. Then he leveled his T-shirt gun and fired a weighted net out of it at the creature. The horse snorted and charged at him again, riderless, but it was less an attack and more a senseless flailing. He watched as color returned to the creature’s mane in a matter of seconds. Vince sidestepped the horse and it wandered into the snow aimlessly leaving him with nothing to worry about but the demon.

The demon tore free of his net and howled, a nauseating wave of sulfur and terror radiating outwards from it. Vince forced himself to suck in a breath around it and said, “George Thurgood, you have not chosen me, but I have called you!”

Again, no result other than the demon lunging at him in spite of the net tangled around its legs. The creature wasn’t particularly elegant in its approach but it was strong enough to pull up the net’s anchoring pinion without breaking stride so it didn’t really need that much finesse to go with it. Vince sidestepped the attack, drawing his sword in one smooth motion and tripping the demon on its way past.

That was a mistake. The creature almost got a grip on his foot before he could dance away from where it fell. Once he’d opened some distance Vince leveled the point of his sword at the demon to discourage it from making another lunge like that. That hadn’t worked too well in the past but there was no harm in trying it again. On the bright side, passing behind the creature gave him a chance to look at the back of its helmet and see there was no lieutenant’s bar painted there. He wasn’t sure that had been the way in the early days but it was worth running with.

“Cole Emmery, you have not chosen me, but I have called you!”

The creature howled, staggering to its feet as it clawed at its head. “Silence! No one will choose you, Vince Porter! You are no savior, no redeemer, no minister to the down trodden. Men live their short, agonizing lives hungering for the release of oblivion and you spend your days dragging them away from the small scraps of death they find!”

Vince scowled. This was definitely a demon, then, since it finally responded to the challenge. It had the magical ability to get under his skin just like all the others he’d encountered and just like all the others he forced himself to ignore it. “In the name of Christ be freed, Cole!” He lifted the point of his sword to the sky. “There awaits for you a just and merciful Lord who will open the gates of paradise to you!”

“There is nothing after this!” The demon shrieked. “Nothing but oblivion before and oblivion after, between which is only the terrifying agony of life!”

The point of his sword came down and pointed at the possessed man. “All authority in heaven and earth is entrusted to the Sons and Daughters of God; that which we bind on earth will be bound in heaven! Your lord is Prince of the Earth. May you, also, be bound to the earth and Cole Emmery set loose to rise to heaven! In the name of Jesus!”

As Vince cut his blade upward the possessed man’s body shuddered and it let out a gasp. He saw a wisp of light slip upwards. An oily shadow pulled out in the opposite direction, leaving the body of the creature to collapse lifeless on the ground. The shadow tried to slip away but Vince lunged forward and drove his sword through it, pinning it in place. “You can wait there until Judgment Day.”

A final, whispered scream rose from the shadow and was carried away on the last gasps of the wind. The snow had stopped and left Vince standing in two inches of snow by the body of a hundred year old man. He huffed out a sigh and let go of the hilt of his sword. Blade and shadow were drawn into the earth to wait for the End of All Things and Vince started back towards the ski lodge to get warm and call Remi.

When Spoof isn’t Enough

Posted by natechen on

From the title page Out of the Soylent Planet is utterly unrepentant about what it is. Robert Kroese has written a pretty fast moving and incredibly silly book about an intergalactic conman named Rex Nihilo and his long-suffering robot sidekick Sasha. It has lasguns. It has spaceships. It has lots and lots and lots of robots who are all forbidden from having any kind of original thoughts (Sasha included.) What it didn’t manage that well was laughs, at least not in my book.

Right off the bat I should note that humor is an extremely subjective topic and the fact that I didn’t find Kroese’s work funny doesn’t mean you’ll be equally unimpressed. I’ve heard several people say they thought it was hilarious. From a totally dispassionate point of view Kroese builds a number of jokes in very workmanlike fashion and executes on them well. That’s fine, but workmanlike humor kind of misses the point, at least in my opinion. Again, humor is hard to quantify.

All that said, I don’t intend to critique the humor in this review. I recommend reading a sample of one of the Rex Nihilo books and seeing if you laugh at it, since Kroese’s humor doesn’t change much in nature or tone over the course of the book. What you see is what you will get. You’ll probably get a better grasp of how much you’ll like his sense of humor firsthand rather than trying to see it through the lens of this review.

Instead, I’m going to recommend you avoid this book because the story and characters are very lackluster. I’m not a fan of negative reviews overall, mainly because poor quality media tends to fall into the same pitfalls over and over again. However, while I didn’t like Kroese’s humor and I thought his story had a lot of flaws, I can say it was original! In a way. Which is to say, I found its failures unique and refreshing in their own way.

As I said at the beginning, from the title onward Soylent Planet wears its idea on its sleeve. It is all about making fun of well known scifi ideas and properties. It begins with a chapter long sendup of Star Wars. The issue I have with it is that the Star Wars parody plays out along side the introduction of our characters rather than serving as the introduction to our characters. Rex and Sasha play no direct part in that parody they just watch it play out. It’s parody for the sake of parody, rather than a parody that also tells a story of its own. It’s more a distraction from the story than an enhancement for it and it had the side effect of making our protagonists less than the most interesting thing in the room.

If nothing else, this isn’t a running issue in the story. After this strange introductory chapter Rex and Sasha step up into center stage and their decisions do drive the story and are the major focus of the narrative, rather than being a sort of side show to a parody Kroese is running in parallel. However once Rex and Sasha are in the limelight we run into another problem. Rex is a character that borders on total incompetence who manages to stumble through things on luck. Again, this can work in a humorous story. The Pink Panther films comes to mind. The effectiveness of that is down to the quality of the humor in the story, which again is going to vary from reader to reader. I’ve already said all I have to say about that.

Sasha, on the other hand, is a robot who is forbidden to have original thoughts of her own. If she approaches such a thought, a safety mechanism reboots her. That’s an interesting idea, reminiscent of the narcoleptic character in the movie Rat Race, and seems like it should be the center of numerous gags. It’s not. Instead, it’s a plot device that allows Rex to escape the final danger he faces which is fine, in and of itself. I’m not saying that Kroese should have cut this plot device from the climax of the story, I think the two things could easily coexist. I just felt like neither character really had a central element that really held the story together.

Instead, Rex seems to bounce around from one scenario to another, spoofing on famous scifi ideas, and Sasha is dragged along in his wake. Both characters feel dragged by the plot, reacting rather than acting. Now, character agency is a tricky thing and I do think that passive or reactive characters are just as good as active ones, contrary to popular belief. But I like my reactive characters to have strong, well define core motivations that define their reactions. While Sasha is programmed to serve, that’s as close as either character gets to such a central motivation. I would’ve liked to see a stronger core to both characters to balance their passivity in this book.

What I can praise Kroese for is a good setup and payoff for the plot. He does a reasonable job of putting all the pieces in place for his climax before he gets there and he clearly enjoyed writing it. While many of the transitions in the story are clunky, the core idea is pretty polished. I want to enjoy this book. It’s just crammed full of things that make it hard for me. I wanted this story to have a point, to do something of its own with its characters and world. Kroese built it to spoof on scifi ideas and tropes instead. He executed on that idea pretty well in Soylent Planet. Whether you’ll enjoy that or not is a matter of taste.

Tales of Winter

Posted by natechen on

The question of what makes a good man is a perennial one. Where the role of women as the nurturers and caregivers of society has always been a pretty solid baseline for individual women to accept or reject, as creatures who seek frontiers and challenges men have always had to find new things to define themselves. While intellectual pursuits have always been a venue for masculine success the form they take varies. In ancient Greece you could be a philosopher. As time wound forward intellectual men turned to art, although philosophy by no means lost its cachet during this time. By the time the 1800s rolled around, science largely usurped both philosophy and art as the realm of the successful thinking man. These days the masculine intellectual works in technology or mass media.

The same is true of the men who are most skilled in working with their hands or who make their living through physical activity (although admittedly it seems the life of the professional athlete has changed the least over time.) There’s nothing inherently wrong with change in the way things work. However very rapid change can result in men getting unmoored from every touchstone that makes it possible for them to navigate life. Very few artists are tackling the question of what it means to be a man in the modern era. Andrew Klavan is one of those few.

Klavan’s Cameron Winter novels are an interesting study in what it means to be a good man, presenting us with a protagonist who is not exactly an expert on the subject but possesses many of the basic qualities that have made manhood vital to the human experience. At the same time, we learn that for most of his life Winter had none of the role models that made it clear how to use them. There are many stories in the world today that create a strong dual narrative between a character’s formative years learning and growing contrasted against where they wind up after they are adults. What’s interesting is how Klavan uses this device.

Many of the worst parts of Winter’s history are now the impetus for him to set right wrongs in the world. That, in and of itself, is not unusual. However Winter isn’t bent on vengeance for the things he lost or trying to make up for his emotional shortcomings through action. Instead he’s trying to understand the virtues he didn’t learn in his youth by righting wrongs he finds in adulthood. That’s an interesting lens to use.

When Christmas Comes is the tale of a man who must make a judgment between good and evil at a moment when, for better or worse, he’s the only one who sees the situation with the clarity to weigh all the factors. This requires Cameron to confront his own biases and consider how appropriate they are. A Strange Habit of Mind takes this to the next step, forcing Winter to consider problems from more than one point of view and weight the outcomes of his decisions on a much bigger scale.

In the first story, the question of what is going on is just as important as the right thing to do. In the second, Winter must weigh what is going on against the various good and evil actions of a wide variety of people. That’s refreshing. Most, if not all stories of the modern day begin with a right course of action presumed based on social dynamics like status or race. They also usually leave the consequences of their protagonist’s decisions conspicuously absent from the end of the story, or present such wildly unbelievable outcomes as to make the entire story meaningless.

However, based on plot alone Klavan’s stories are not particularly notable. They don’t do anything new. It’s the execution of those plots where Klavan’s abilities really shine. Klavan is a very experienced crime writer who excels at sketching his characters and building an atmosphere of melancholy and anticipation. We know Winter isn’t in the best place. He is building a better world for himself and others, one step at a time. It is fascinating to watch the decisions Winter makes on that journey. He makes deliberate actions and his emotions follow well illustrated paths, facing opponents who are well calibrated to him as a character and as an investigator.

It’s hard to point to anything Klavan does badly. That alone isn’t enough to make a great story but when you have at least one standout skill – as with Klavan’s character writing – you do get very good ones. The Cameron Winter novels are definitely good stories. I recommend checking them out so you can be on the train when a great one arrives, because I have a feeling we’re not that far from the moment the definitive Cameron Winter story drops.

They Come in Pairs

Posted by natechen on

One of the seminal manga of the early 21st century was Himoru Arakawa’s Fullmetal Alchemist. It’s a gripping story full of interesting characters living in a deep and fantastical world with a clear and understandable “magic” system. The story began simply and spiraled out into seemingly ever more complex layers. At the end, however, the place we began turned out to be the place we arrived at: The maxim that mankind cannot gain anything without giving something of equal value in return. The fundamental law of alchemy proved to be the fundamental law of the story.

Arakawa has a flair for characters and simple but striking visuals in action scenes, skills she has levered in her artwork for other series. However she hasn’t produced her own fantasy story in over a decade. Silver Spoon, her love letter to the farmers of her home island of Hokkaido, is a great story but also a very mundane one. When I heard she had launched Yomi no Tsugai (localized as Daemons from the Shadow Realm, a literal but somewhat cringey translation), a new fantasy work, I was immediately interested.

First, and perhaps most interesting, Yomi no Tsugai is set in contemporary Japan. While Arakawa’s previous original creation was set in the modern era adding a layer of the supernatural on top of that added a level of depth and, just as importantly, gave her the opportunity to add a rich symbolic language to her story like she did in Fullmetal Alchemist. I cracked open the first chapter with great anticipation.

I was not disappointed.

That said, I was very, very surprised by the nature of the story Arakawa presented. Fullmetal Alchemist featured what is known as a “hard” magic system, where there is a system of supernatural occurrences that work on a series of concrete, almost scientific rules. The story’s titular alchemy has several solid, predictable maxims. Mass must be conserved. Energy needs to come from somewhere. The dead cannot come back to life. Our protagonist, Edward Elric, is a man of knowledge and reason, as befits a master of what is essentially a branch of science in his own world. Edward and his brother Alphonse are as close and brothers can be. The bonds between Edward and his family are a central driving force in his life and he relies on them from beginning to end.

Yomi no Tsugai has what is known as a “soft” magic system. There are few or no hard and fast rules in a soft magic system, they represent the bizarre and inexplicable forces in life that mankind have always struggled to understand and live with. In this case, these forces are called tsugai, spirits of the netherworld that bind themselves to certain people. Tsugai have abilities based on what they are and usually follow some kind of theme. They’re unpredictable and often hard for people to understand. There’s only one concrete rule about tsugai; but more on that in a moment.

Our story opens on the birth of our protagonist. This is not a normal place to start, in fact it would be downright inadvisable except that Yuru and Asa are children of prophecy – twins born on a day where light and dark are equal, one at night and one during the day. This condemns them to a cruel fate. They have the potential to access phenomenal abilities for the low, low cost of dying once and, whether they want to pay that cost or not, others are happy to force it upon them.

The twins are cruelly separated and then cruelly brought together again. Circumstances conspire to destroy all trust between them and Yuru, our protagonist, is forced to leave his home and doubt almost every meaningful connection he has formed in his entire life. Even the village he was brought up in was a lie. Yuru has been raised in a society still living in the middle ages and when he leaves he finds himself in modern day Japan, with all the culture shocks that come with that. It turns out that Yuru is totally ignorant of the world he lives in. The only thing he has to rely on are Sayuu-sama, the guardian deities of his home village. Sayuu-sama are tsugai, the spirits that live in two stone statues that defended the gates of the village for four hundred years. This brings us to the one hard and fast rule of tsugai.

They come in pairs.

The statue on the Left and the statue on the Right are as opposite as they can be. The Left is a stoic woman, not given to expressing herself much, with a hard attitude and a tendency to go out and solve problems proactively. The Right is a boisterous, outgoing man. He defends what he cares about, expresses his fondness for others readily and encourages Yuru to think for himself. Only their stone bodies and dedication to their master Yuru join them together.

What’s fascinating is that, just like equivalent exchange in Fullmetal Alchemist, this paired yet opposite nature of tsugai is reflected in every aspect of the story. Yuru and Asa are fraternal twins, a boy and a girl. Through the story we quickly learn that they pair day and night, light and dark, binding and release, stoicism and emotivism. They are caught between two warring factions, one of which pursues modernity, the other which tries to restore the past. Asa chooses to align herself with a faction, Yuru announces his intention to stand alone.

It’s as if every aspect of the story is slowly revealing itself as another tsugai who’s character, powers and intentions we have to wrap our minds around in order to understand the narrative. It’s brilliant but also exactly what I should have expected from Arakawa. She’s very deliberate with her storytelling. Perhaps far more so than I ever anticipated. It was only when I got current with Yomi no Tsugai and went back to reread Fullmetal Alchemist while I waited for more of Yuru’s story that I made the final discovery. I’ve hinted at it already. That is, of course, that Yomi no Tsugai and Fullmetal Alchemist are also a pair.

They pair hard and soft magic. A fantasy world and a world like the present. A protagonist of science and reason with intact relationships and a protagonist of ignorance and naivety who’s trust has been broken. The thematic core of Yomi no Tsugai looks like it has been implemented in such a way as to duplicate that theme even when it’s just sitting on a shelf next to Arakawa’s previous work! That’s a very meta inference to make, I know. And yet creating a good story requires such care and intentionality that I can easily believe that Arakawa went to that level when crafting Yomi no Tsugai.

Is it true? I don’t know. But I certainly intend to keep reading ’til I find out.