As some of you may know, my web comic SaveHiatus.com has undergone a change in format. The artist, Adam Levermore-Rich, has been swamped with other (paying) projects which has left him no time for minor chores like sleep or remembering his children's names, so he's taking a break.
In the meantime, to keep Hiatus alive in the minds of its millions of fans, I have started a serial novelization of Hiatus' pilot episode, "Encounter in Forever on the Edge of the City of Tomorrow" based on the teleplay by showrunner Manny Ulrich. The first chunk went up today:
quote:Inky black space, sparkling with gemstone stars, fills your mind to overflowing. The sheer, unfathomable enormity of it threatens to burst open your brain like a child's balloon. Here and there bright marbles sparkle in the distant sunlight but they remain marbles, easily lost or discarded. Below you is the marble that keeps you alive. Earth is wrapped in a frigid embrace, streaked with blue and green and wreathed in fluffy white fluffiness, but from up here it is chillingly apparent that almost anything -- natural disaster, particularly viral pathogen, sufficiently violent political upheaval, asteroid strike, planetary temperature rising a mere 10 degrees -- could take that paper-thin ecosystem keeping humanity alive and rip it away, leaving billions of souls gasping and boiling where they fell, even as--
Actually, spaceflight only affects you that way if you stick with classical music. That's why early spaceflight pilots were awoken with peppy tunes piped in from ground control; enough replays of "Thus Spake Zarathustra" could make anyone want to set their controls for the heart of dowtown Houston and fire all thrusters. And the song chosen for inclusion in humanity's letter-in-the-bottle Voyager launch was The Rolling Stones "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction," which should have served to warn any approaching aliens of both our race's general crankiness and our love of the double negative.
Judging from the pounding bass line that was just barely audible through the thin air of the stratosphere, the captain of the small two-man Orbhopper ship currently blasting over the horizon preferred to vanquish the terrifying insignificance that space bestows by cranking up "Exhaust Port Woman, You're a Shot in a Million" by The Walloping Pandroids. Also a good choice.
But music aside, what really helps you ignore the vastness of eternity is to be really, really pissed off.
Move past the ship. Sink down through the clouds. (Try not to scream, this is a literary device.) Zip over and approach the western seaboard of the United States. Circle around, observing the regulated flight patterns, until you are silently drifting over San Mateo, California. Head for the coast. There, nestled in what was once a bayland marsh protected by the government to preserve endangered species, lies the magnificent Hill Institute, a rambling collection of gleaming white buildings and relaxing parks. Founded in 2027 by Gene Hill, futurian and biologist, in its first 10 years the Hill Institute was responsible for 341 distinct patents, each one a miraculous innovation that would help mankind. Which, frankly, was more than the Salt Marsh Harvest Mouse ever did.
There's more at www.savehiatus.com, with new chunks coming every Monday and Friday.
Just so you know.
[ September 12, 2008, 07:45 AM: Message edited by: Chris Bridges ]
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Oh, Chris. I love you. It's a platonic love, but nevertheless.
Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :
I keep getting a "page load error" message. Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Link fixed (got the comma mixed in there).
Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :
Wow. If this were a dead tree book, I'd buy it in a heartbeat. Posted by Goody Scrivener (Member # 6742) on :
I WILL be printing these out!!! You guys are awesome!
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
I think there is a typo, from the WSJ article... it's obviously been postponed November 2008 to July 2009
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Should all go well, I'll be collecting this in free e-book form in several formats, updated chapter by chapter as I go, and offering the whole thing as a print book through Lulu.com or someplace once it's complete.
Posted by scifibum (Member # 7625) on :
I'm starting to think there's something special about this Hiatus show that I failed to *get* at first.
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
Awesome!
I sent an e-mail to the Walls Street Journal reporter, informing her that her dates were wrong, but I was sure she'd already been corrected by deluges of irate Harry Potter fans.
She emailed back thanking me and saying that I was the first to notice!
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Next chunk has been posted. Parvo is surrounded by futuristic people just futuring all over each other.
Posted by Leonide (Member # 4157) on :
quote:I'm starting to think there's something special about this Hiatus show that I failed to *get* at first.
You mean that it's only the BEST sci-fi show to have ever been produced in the history of television?
Yeah, I know what you mean.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
Shouldn't you be saving this for NaNoWriMo?
Posted by theCrowsWife (Member # 8302) on :
He can do episode two for NaNoWriMo...
--Mel
Posted by scifibum (Member # 7625) on :
quote:You mean that it's only the BEST sci-fi show to have ever been produced in the history of television?
Isn't your sentence is missing an 'n'?
I feel stupid about not understanding at first. I must have read two or three posts here on Hatrack and glanced at the savehiatus.com site every time, and I *didn't understand*.
Evidently I'm not supposed to be explicit about what I didn't understand because you people are all acting a certain way and that's what fooled me.
Posted by Shmuel (Member # 7586) on :
Welcome to the fandom, scifibum! Now go forth and confuse others.
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