Here's a proposed challenge for any of us who want to get some more insight into moment-to-moment writing decisions:

Every week by 9PM EST Thursday of each week, anyone who wants to participate for the week writes the next bit of the story (in the first week, it would be a story opening). This next bit could be only a few dozen words, or as much as a thousand words.

All of the proposed next bits are e-mailed to me or entered into a special Web site, and are posted Thursday night or Friday morning. From then until 9PM EST Sunday, anyone who wants to can rate each of the new bits with a 1-10 (10 is highest) rating in terms of how effectively it carries on the story, and makes comments about what made it more or less successful. The rating is only about how well it continues the story, not how well written it is in general -- although I imagine these will often go together.

Then the piece with the highest total score becomes the next bit of the story, and the following week we write proposed bits to follow that. The "winning" bit remains anonymous, so that the focus remains on the writing decisions and not on the "winner." If the winning bit states it's intended to be the end of the story, the story ends (and if we want, we start another). At that point we could decide to post who wrote which bit if we want.

We could carry this on in special threads here at Hatrack if that's OK, or I could set up a special Web site for doing it.

The point of the exercise is to see the diverse ways in which various of us will approach continuing the same story: Seeing what the options were, and what the consequences are of following one option or another. If one writer adds a piece that shores up the basic decency of the protagonist while another shows a despicable flaw, which do we find more satisfying? How much does that depend on context? How important is maintaining a consistent writing style? etc.

I'd be curious whether anyone would be interested in trying this; of course I'm game. Let me know by Sunday evening? Of course you could decide to participate or not for each week as we went forward.

If we came up with something we really liked, we might try submitting it for publication somewhere; if it were accepted, we'd have to decide what to do with the proceeds as a group.

Luc
 

Oh well.
 

I'm game for the game.
 

I agree that the logistics are hard to communicate beforehand. The first week I'll post "now it's time to do this - now it's time to do that," and after that I think it will be easy.

This should be fun. :)

Luc
 

TTFN & lol

Cosmi
 

Chris

 

We may have a special area on Hatrack set up soon, but in the mean time we can conduct the Writing Decisions Challenge right here.

Anyone who'd like to participate for this week writes the first little bit of a story -- not even a full scene, unless it's quite a short one.

(You can participate in just the weeks you want to: you don't have to participate every week.)

Your opening can be anything from about thirty words to 1,000 words, but we're shooting for something in the neighborhood of 100-200 words. Don't worry about finishing the scene or stopping at a logical stopping place: Instead, break it off anywhere that works for you.

The goal is to start a story that is engaging to the reader and that makes her/him avid to read what happens next. You don't have to know how the story goes from your opening, and in fact it's probably better not to know, since other people will be writing some of it if your piece is the one we continue with.

I think some kind of speculative fiction genre will be best for us here, since so many of us are interested in F/SF, but it doesn't have to be speculative: your piece can be written in any genre (or no genre), any style, any voice. You don't even have to know what the genre is before you start.

PLEASE DON'T POST YOUR OPENINGS HERE. Instead, e-mail them to me at luc@meadowdance.org, from any e-mail address, by Thursday at 9PM EST. Please use the subject line "Writing Decisions." I'll collect all the openings and post them, anonymously and in random order, for people to rate. I'll describe rating in detail when I post the openings.

OK, let's go write some openings!

Luc
 

Luc
 

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

#1
It was one of those completely quiet nights in the mountains. The kind of quiet that even the crickets seemed reluctant to disturb. That's why Jason Fine was so surprised when he glanced out the window and saw the spaceship sitting in his backyard.

"When the hell did that get here?" he mused.

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

#2
"Whoa, whoa, don’t lift off yet!"

"The door has closed," said the Sabirul, and as if that settled it, she twisted her long, white body under an archway and headed toward the interior of the ship.

"Hey!" Carrie yelled. "Hey!" She grabbed one of the Sabirul’s back legs and pulled. It was tall, of course, but the Sabirul had evolved under lighter gravity and they were spindly; easy to drag. "Aren’t you guys going to take off? I’m not one of your crew members, in case you haven’t noticed."

"The Code of the Sabirul does not permit the door to be opened once it has been closed. There are customs and procedural conflicts," it said, all the while pulling its leg to try to get free.

"I thought humans weren’t permitted to stay on your ships," Carrie said desperately. What was wrong with this thing? Was it mentally deficient?

The Sabirul finally managed to wrestle free and galloped away.

"They’re not, but there is nothing I can do," it called back. Then it bent its gummy body to get around a nose-shaped projection in the corridor and was gone.

Carrie reflected that two wrongs would have made a perfectly good right in this case. She snatched up her VR kit and set off after it, hoping to find someone who would have some kind of sense. There was no chance they would take her off into space with them; humans had been trying to hitch rides ever since the Sabirul appeared out of the night sky eighteen years before. Specialists like Carrie -- she was a computer reality troubleshooter -- could enter the ships on the ground; even curiosity seekers sometimes could. But no one was allowed to stay until lift-off.

===============================================
#3

The leaves were falling like rain that morning, hard and fast. Jacob was in one of those moods were being pelted with dead leaves, and occasionally having them slip between his shirt and coat, was a wonderful thing. He didn't know why he was in this mood or where it had come from, nor did he really want to know. Jacob knew from experience that the best thing to do with these moods was to surrender to them the way that mother he had just passed had surrendered to the loud demands for sweets from her two cute kids. Jacob paused for a moment, looked up at the clouds obscuring the dim Autumn sun and smiled.

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

#4

"This isn’t what I asked for."

"Yes it is." Eldon’s beard was beginning to itch like it did when he became angry. He’d spent so much work making the program exactly what Mr. Thewood wanted that he didn’t have the patience to deal with a man who had no idea what he wanted in the first place.

"I didn’t ask for sentience."

"There is no other way to accomplish everything you demanded when you gave me the project." He put no emphasis on the word ‘demanded’ but the stress was there all the same. Mr. Thewood had said he wouldn’t buy the program unless it did everything he wanted it to do. The program was a good one.

"I will not have a computer program going crazy on my customers!"

Now, that just made Eldon plain mad. He was the best programmer he’d ever met, and chances were, the best in the world. Not the most renowned, but really good nonetheless. Eldon had made sure the program was imbedded with ethics to make a nun feel smothered.

"Just because it’s the first sentient computer program ever invented doesn’t mean I was careless. I’ve read all the Sci-fi. I know what not to do. It’s perfectly harmless."

"Nothing’s perfectly harmless."

"This is. And I made it incredibly loyal. Its only desire is to make you happy. This program is a couple million dollars in your pocket, Mr. Thewood. And nine months of my time, which you haven’t paid me for yet, so I’d appreciate it if ... "

A fresh look of greed entered Mr. Thewood’s eyes, and he wrote Eldon a check for two hundred thousand dollars. "I expect a full refund if the program goes wacko on me. I’ll need the money to fly to Korea, or somewhere where they haven’t heard my name. And I will hold you entirely responsible, so if anyone gets hurt, you’re going to jail. You still want to sell me your little program?"

Eldon smiled. Now, this was more the kind of man he liked. Cautious, but willing in the end. "You bet." He stuffed the check in his pocket and walked out, feeling confident.

=================================================
#5

Sammie spread her bedroom curtains apart just a little to check. Those Pinter boys were still out there, skateboarding, waiting for her to go out and leave it unguarded. Well, they weren’t going to get it. She went back to it now, to where it was hidden among the model horses on her toy shelf, a little lump of crystal that looked flat black most of the time, but lit up a little inside once you’d held it a while. She peered in again. It was true, you could see something inside it, a little clearer every time. It was beginning to look like a little city, maybe. Or some kind of crystals growing inside the crystal, or something.

Those Pinters would have to go home for supper some time. It was already getting dark. But Sammie still felt jumpy, so she decided to find a better place to hide it.

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

More information:
Anyone can rate any or all of the pieces submitted. You don’t have to have been involved before, and you don’t have to have written a submission of your own.

Each week, rate on how well each piece of the story worked for you as part of the story we’re constructing to date. The lowest possible rating is a 1, meaning the story didn’t work at all for you on any level. The highest possible rating is a 10, meaning the piece was wonderfully executed, continued the story in a satisfying way on all levels, and added depth, meaning and/or interest to the experience of reading it.

Any comments you can make as to how effectively the piece continued to carry or failed to continue to carry the story are great. You don’t have to comment on any given piece if you don’t want.

Each submission has a number associated with it. Please post your ratings here. Here’s one suggested format, showing the piece number, the rating, and comments below.

Piece #12: 6
The episode with the meteor was really enjoyable.
I didn’t understand the part about the ball bearings.

#13: 3

#14: 8
Loved the mermaid.

[etc.]

The overall rating for each piece will be the average of those ratings actually given to it. A piece that doesn’t receive any ratings can’t be the piece used to continue the story.

You can submit your ratings anonymously by e-mailing them to me at luc@meadowdance.org.

You don't have to pick a favorite: Just rate each piece on its own merits.

Thanks for sitting through the long introduction. On to the rating!

Luc

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited October 10, 2002).]
 

Luc
 

#1: 9

i really like this one. has a very Douglas Adams feel. could be fun.

#2: 8

#3: 4

#4: 6

#5: 8
 

#1 9 Lots of potential for development

#2 4 Didn't ring my bell

#3 5 Description too vague

#4 5 Too convoluted to start

#5 8 Most well-written, but I prefer straightforward SF

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

#1 7 Liked the situation and the problem being presented right off. Lighter treatment than I normally enjoy.

#3 6

#4 5 Interested in the characters, less so in the situation. Some of the wording kept me less involved in the story than I would otherwise be.

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited October 11, 2002).]
 

#2 5 Might want to read more
#3 4 Not all that interesting
#4 7 Piqued my curiosity
#5 5 Again, might want to see where this goes
 

#1 9 Nice description, lots of room to grow.
#2 5 Seemed convoluted to read, didn’t grab my attention
#3 4 Didn’t interest me
#4 7 Interesting setup, but didn’t grab very strongly
#8 7 Interesting setup but too familiar
 

#1: 3
Spaceships popping up seemed very unrealistic. If meant to be light-hearted and comedic, I would have liked to have seen some comdey to let me know.

#2: 7
Grabbed my attention. A little part of me is trying to tell me that there's a cliche somewhere, but the rest of me doesn't care.

#4: 6
Seems like it's headed down a path well-travelled, but it was very well written.

#5: 8
Seems a bit odd, but it reminds me of that disturbing movie where David Bowie kidnaps a baby. It was good, and so I think this one is definitely going places.

 

OK, first week results are complete! Final scores as I get them are:

#1, "It was one of those completely quiet nights ...": 7.4

#2, "'Whoa, whoa, don’t lift off yet!'": 5.8

#3, "The leaves were falling like rain that morning ...": 4.6

#4, "'This isn’t what I asked for.'": 6.0

#5, "Sammie spread her bedroom curtains apart just a little ...": 7.2

So: close in the end, but #1 has it.

We seemed to have a lot of difference of opinion about #s 1, 2, and 5, even though I noticed people went out of the way not to let their personal genre preferences influence the scores too strongly (good for you!).

We seemed to favor quite short beginnings that immediately plunge into some kind of conflict. Two people mentioned the light character of the first (winning) piece and said they weren't crazy about that.

The one piece that sought to establish only character and not an initial conflict (at least, that was my reading) really seemed to take it on the chin. Apparently we strongly favor getting some kind of involving issue out immediately.

Pieces that didn't immediately grab us and/or ones that felt familiar seemed to rate pretty low. OK, so that's kind of self-evident.

Anyone else have any observations on this?

For this week (deadline: 9 PM EST Thursday), anyone who likes could write a piece continuing #1. As before, please e-mail it to luc@meadowdance.org for anonymous posting after the deadline.

If you submit a piece this week, it should continue effectively from where paragraph #1 lets off. Length can be anything up to 1,000 words again. Please post here with any questions.

Thanks, and looking forward to seeing the story continue!

Luc
 

Count me in for upcoming submission rounds.

 

Don't forget, deadline for continuations of the story so far is Thursday at 9PM EST -- please e-mail your continuations to luc@meadowdance.org. For reference, here's the beginning of our story again:

It was one of those completely quiet nights in the mountains. The kind of quiet that even the crickets seemed reluctant to disturb. That's why Jason Fine was so surprised when he glanced out the window and saw the spaceship sitting in his backyard.

"When the hell did that get here?" he mused.

Luc
 

Which brings up a point that might be educational for me: Are there times when I'm writing a story when I avoid something that might make the story better because it will make it more difficult for me as a writer to continue the story?

Luc
 

quote:

---

Are there times when I'm writing a story when I avoid something that might make the story better because it will make it more difficult for me as a writer to continue the story?

---

[This message has been edited by GZ (edited October 16, 2002).]
 

OK, so anyone who'd like to participate rates some or all of these submissions on a scale of 1-10 in terms of how engaging they are and how well they continue the story. Any comments you can make about the kinds of decisions that were made would be interesting. Please refer to other posts or e-mail me if you have questions or would like a lengthier explanation.

You can post your ratings here or e-mail them to luc@meadowdance.org. I'll post the ratings as they're received.

Sunday at 9PM EST I'll tabulate and we'll find out which piece will continue.

- Luc

---
Here is the beginning to our story. All of the submissions are ways the story can be continued.

OUR STORY SO FAR
----------------
It was one of those completely quiet nights in the mountains. The kind of quiet that even the crickets seemed reluctant to disturb. That's why Jason Fine was so surprised when he glanced out the window and saw the spaceship sitting in his backyard.

"When the hell did that get here?" he mused.

THE PROPOSED CONTINUATIONS
--------------------------

#6

"Mom, come here!"

"I'm washing dishes," Jason's mother yelled from downstairs.

"Come quick, seriously!" Jason shouted. "You've got to see this!" He ran to the window and took a good look at the thing. Not a flying saucer out of a late-night movie, exactly, but it had to be a spaceship. There was a door opening. Jason glued his face to the cold glass. Snow began to drift down over the bulgy, helmet-like shape of the space ship.

His mother opened the door and strode in at the same moment that a tube extended from the ship to the ground, where it ended in a kind of doorway. A short, chunky-looking creature with four hands and bulging eyeballs walked out.

"What?" snapped Jason's mom.

"The spaceship!" Jason breathed. "The little space guy!"

Jason's mom marched over beside him and looked out the window. "Very funny. Where?"

"There! Right there! In the yard!"

"Jason, I am tired of being called up here every ten minutes," Jason's mom said in a steely voice, and she grabbed him by the ear the way she used to do when he was eight or ten years old.

"Jason's in trouble!" sang his sister Kandi from the hallway.

The little space guy waved.

---
#7

"When the hell did that get here?" he mused. "Better not be after the
chickens."

He moved the sheer curtain a bit to see better, and after a glance at the
chicken coop - nothing unusual on that front - stood there contemplating the
addition to his yard, his eyes narrowed. There was no movement from the
thing, no venting steam, no sound or even a smell wafting through the
cracked window. It just sat there silently, lit by the single bright
floodlight attached to his barn.

Jason stood for a moment more, then let the curtain fall. Though he didn’t
realize it, it was significant that the spaceship had chosen Jason Fine's
yard to land in, instead of, for instance, his neighbor's yard down the
road. Jason wasn’t surprised by much -- not his niece’s tattooed boyfriend,
not the two-headed calf born last spring, and not by a spaceship
materializing in his yard in the dead of night. Even if everyone knew that
such things existed only on the TV. Had he thought about it, he could have
easily imagined his immediate neighbors’ reaction -- the astonishment,
followed by hysterics, and the inevitable calling of police. But Jason’s
reaction was quite different, and the decision that he’d made in those few
seconds at the window would change the course of two star systems.

He walked down the hall toward the back door, his pace measured with
deliberation rather than fear. As he passed the gun cabinet he hesitated for
a moment, but decided against it. Now he was at the door, and the spaceship
was on the other side. He paused as the thought occurred that maybe that
thing wasn’t a spaceship. Could very well be those hellraisers down the
road, playing some sort of trick on him. But no. It was way too big, and had
appeared way too quietly, and those kids were way too noisy to pull a stunt
like that. And he hadn’t failed to notice the way the ground had sank a bit
under it. He gripped the smooth knob, and the thought occurred to him that
he was very glad that his wife was away visiting her sister in Boise.

---
#8

Jason haphazardly swiped at the dirty dish in his hand while he studied the
small craft. It was a dull gray streaked with black around the front
window, or at least what he assumed was the front window. No lights. No
markings. Just a hunk of metal obliterating his wife’s flowerbed. As far
as spaceships went, it was down right disappointing.

"Honey, I think you might want to have a look at this," he called into the
direction of the living room, his eyes never leaving the object in the yard.
Marcy would never forgive him for not telling her something happened to
her prized mums. Or that they had visitors from another planet.

"I’m not coming in there until you’ve got those dishes done. It’s your turn
and you aren’t sweet talking me into doing them for you."

"This isn’t about weaseling out of the dishes..." Jason’s reply tapered off
as a piece of the craft’s side broke away from the body of the ship and slid
to one side. A beam of light shot out of the exposed portal and swept
across the yard. Then a figure stepped out.

The dish in Jason’s hands fell into the sink with a clatter.

---
#9

He had not heard a thing in the deep silence of the surrounding mountains,
not the hushed braking of retro-thrusters whispering through the passes nor
the locking of landing struts echoing across the slumbering lake beyond his
cabin. True, the transport had not been due for another three Earth hours
and his final packing had claimed his attention, but a landing spaceship
slipping outside his personal radar meant he was getting sloppy.

He sighed with a well-practiced imitation of an Earthling, feeling once again
the conflict of his reluctance to leave the planet and his anxiety to be gone
from it, but ended his sigh with a genuinely alarmed intake of breath. The
night clouds that broke in a ragged opening around the moon increased the
illumination reflecting off the iridescent hull of the spaceship and revealed
the fluted edges along its lateral flanges, an identifying feature of a
Dawkin stealthcraft.

Somehow they had found him.

He counted it a stroke of luck that he had glanced out the window when he
did. With a swiftness that belied his human body, he grabbed only his
shoulder pack and sprinted for the front door. They may have already
surrounded the cabin, he thought as he hesitated for the smallest of moments,
but there's no other way. He left the thought at the door as he sped into
the outside darkness toward the lake, the lighter Earth gravity a decided
advantage for him.

---
#10

"Three days ago, honey," Rita said, not turning from the shopping show she was
watching. "I told you I bought it, remember?"

Jason remembered having got upset about something expensive she had bought
without his permission, but he was fairly sure it wasn't a spaceship. He would
have remembered that. "That's right," he told his wife.

Earlier in the evening Jason had noticed the Schmidts' cocker spaniel was
unusually quiet. Maybe the aliens had abducted her; that would be the nicest
thing that had happened to Jason all week. But, if his luck held, the Schmidts
would probably blame him for Kiki-bear's disappearance and make him pay for her.
He wondered if there were a way he could arrange to be abducted and get the
aliens to leave Kiki-bear behind.

"Where you going, honey?" Rita called as he pulled on a coat and opened the back
door.

"Out," Jason answered, and he shut the door behind him.

---
#11

[I used /s to indicate italics from the original.]

Of course, as any rational person knows, a spaceship isn't the kind of thing you want in your backyard when you're expecting company. Jason put down his broom, pulled an old sweatshirt over his dress clothes, and went to attend to the matter.

"Excuse me." His breath froze before him as he spoke. "Excuse me, but you can't park here." He traversed the lawn and paused beside the cherry red hull of the monster. Silence. "Excuse me." Jason rapped at the side of the ship. More silence. He moved to knock again when he heard it: a faint, distant "thump."

"Beg your pardon?" He put an ear against the ship. A pause, then another barely audible "thump." Jason pulled away. /Oh dear. Car doors./ He spun around and sprinted back to the house. As the scuffle of feet approached, Jason made a mad dash from window to window, pulling curtains down and blinds shut.

The doorbell rang a mix of high, resonating melodies -- the kind of sound that indicates the doorbell costs more than the door, and that, in Jason's case, it must have been an impulse buy. He cringed and dashed into the kitchen. The broom stood propped up against the refrigerator amid a pile of cleaning instruments. "Just a moment!" he called, hurrying over to them, "Just a mo--" and he was on the floor, a wet sponge by his side. Another polyphony from the doorbell. "Oh, I'm coming dammit." Jason rose, rubbed his bum, and scrambled to collect the items. A quick look around and he tossed them into the pantry.

Jason took a deep breath. /Well, that'll do. Just have to make it through tonight. And I'll do it; even with a million spaceships I'd do it./ He walked, as casually as a man in his particular situation could hope, to the front door and pulled it open.

"Well I never!" said a short, middle-aged woman, her hands at her hips. "You know it's rude to keep your guests wait..."

"Hello, Mrs. Durnup, Mr. Durnup. Nice of you to visit." Jason smiled one of those really wide, strained smiles you see sometimes, the kind that looks almost inhuman. Of course, Jason was human, but if Mr. and Mrs. Durnup had been anybody but them (that is to say, if they were far less wrapped up in their own affairs) they would have wondered. However, being that they were, in fact, themselves, they instead gave a:

"Hello Mr. Fine," and left it at that.

"Won't you come in?" Another exceptionally large, forced smile.

"Yes of cour--" Mrs. Durnup stumbled back, knocking Mr. Durnup's rounded form back with her. "What, what is that?"

Jason's stomach sank to his toes and stayed there.

"What?"

"That." She raised a finger to his sweatshirt. It was an old gray thing with blobs of grease and the occasional dripping of nacho cheese stained generously about.

"Oh, well, that..." His stomach rose again, but not quite all the way. It moved between his knees and liver for a bit, then settled for the bladder.

"Hardly appropriate attire for this sort of business, you know." She scowled.
---
#12

Usually you heard them coming: It's not like they were silent. You'd hear a noise like a vacuum cleaner fighting a cat, and something would fly over and your electricity would turn off and your VCR would reset to 12:00. Jason had long since set his word processor to auto-save every two minutes, but the VCR problem bugged the hell out of him.

Twenty years ago, when he was still a relatively young man, he would have been amazed to see a space ship at all, but these days Whitepeak, Colorado was a mecca for secret alien visitors because of the Caverns. There was actually a whole extraterrestrial ghetto of a kind built into the mountain about half a mile away from the Caverns, and some of the restaurants there were outstanding. Most of the food was poison, of course, but a lot of the rest was delicious. There was an eyeball salad he got sometimes at a little Canopian cafe there that was, well, out of this world.

Well, time to get the bozo out of the back yard. Jason sighed, put down his glasses, and took the Antarean destabilizer gun off its hook by the office door. You could never be too careful with these guys.

---
#13
[This one arrived belatedly due to mailing problems.]
Strolling downstairs in his BVDs and undershirt, he wondered what to say to the ship's occupants, assuming there were any. Greetings? Klaatu? Get the hell off my land?

"No where's private anymore," he grumbled, yanking open the door to his cabin. "Freaking aliens, dropping down wherever they want, without so much as a sorry for crushing your mums...." It was better in the old days, when the spaceships were kind enough to land only in remote cornfields. Back then, most folks could still laugh off the idea of alien visitors because they were hardly ever seen, certainly not by anyone of consequence.

Not anymore. Now they plunked down all the time, everywhere. Middle of the highway, back of a house, smack dab in a football stadium. Then there was the particularly large one that took out the Eiffel Tower, causing the Frenchies to surrender. Boy, did they have crepe on their faces when they realized the aliens weren't trying to take over and in fact dropped off a new and much shinier tower as an apology only a few days later.

"You'd think they'd confine their student drivers to an emptier section of the universe," snorted Jason as he approached the ship in his backyard. "Replacement landmarks must cost 'em a fortune!"

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited October 17, 2002).]
 

6: 5. Kind of cliche. I also don't want to go juvenile.
7: 6. All right; steps out of Jason's head big time in the third paragraph,
which is disjointing.
8: 7. Exposition good, but doesn't really wow me.
9: 9. Very interesting! Already establishes tension, a few surprises, setting,
and character. A little confusing, though.
10: 8. Getting things going with plot and characters; not really anything
spectacular, though.
11: 6. Had funny moments, but seemed to be trying too hard; also delaying
confrontation with the aliens for what looks to be something silly.
12: 8. Very well written, interesting setting development. Not terribly
promising story-wise (but maybe I lack imagination).
13: 8. Again, really great setting, fun voice, but limiting plot-wise. Also,
seems to step out of character from the first section a bit.

---

7: 7
Nicely developed, and did a good job of explaining how Jason took things in stride, but not of why he would, which made it less effective to my eye. Liked the "fate of two star systems" thing.

8: 5

9: 7
Effectively initiates a kind of thriller story and introduces some interesting possible elements; no sense of character yet.

10: 8
Enjoyed the fun and humor, and the weird possibility of Rita pulling a fast one, and Jason's apparent onset of senility.

11: 6
Tone felt a little forced to me. Enjoyed the rapid escalation of tension somewhat despite this.

13: 7
Found this funny, playful. No real conflict yet, still just a light situation. Nicely executed. Enjoy the idea of spaceships dropping down all over the place.
 

6:6 not sure if i like the child protagonist, but it holds promise. could be turned into a variety of things: anything from a children/YA scifi thing to a tale about a psychologically disturbed youth.

7:5 like the hinting at the overall plot, but Jason's character seems a bit unbelievable.

8:7 well executed, easy to follow. doesn't do much to further the plot. characters somewhat engaging.

10:8 i like the misunderstanding (right?) between Jason and his wife. characters believable. lots of potential.

12:6 very entertaining, but doesn't offer a lot of options.

13:7

---

6 -- 6 A tad too juvenile, so not my cup of tea
7 -- 6 Characterization pretty good but needs a more consistent POV
8 -- 5 Didn't ring my bell
9 -- 9 I prefer a more serious tone and it was the only serious excerpt here
10 -- 8 Well-written. Nice tongue-in-cheek.
11 -- 5 Insofar as this is SF, I wasn't sure if I should take the stomach thing literally or not, especially after the second reference to it. The conversation seemed to bog the excerpt down a bit.
12 -- 6 This is pretty good but, still, not my cup of tea
13 -- 6 Although too light for my taste, the spaceships as, basically, annoying space vermin was interesting.
 

The risk we run if we rate as writers rather than readers is of coming out with a story that was fun or easy to write, but that isn't as appealing to a reader.

Any thoughts or alternative points of view on this?

Cheers,
Luc
 

#6: 5 Opening tone doesn’t sound right for a kid. Also, written like small
child, but facts of text claim older than 12. Doesn’t jive.

#7: 5 Third paragraph gave away too much, and doesn’t fit with tone of the
rest of the section. Didn’t set right with me.

#9: 9 Kept my interest, wanted to know more.

#10: 9 Situation has humor, was interesting. Characters have potential.

#11: 4 I was completely disinterested in the conversation with the guests.
It just didn’t work for me.

#12: 8 Interesting situation developed.

#13: 7 Funny, but didn’t quite fit tone of opening.
 

Surely passion should inflame our writing, and choosing something that doesn't engage us as readers may not be the best way to go. With all of us contributing what intrigues us as both writers and readers, the final product may be a little disjointed in style, but it stands the best chance of sizzling.

[This message has been edited by Kolona (edited October 19, 2002).]
 

Here are some new ratings for us!

#6 6 Thought this was cute. The little alien wave at the end made me chuckle.

#7 5 Didn't match the beginning and though interesting, was a little heavy for my taste.
---
#8 8 I'd like to follow this and see where it goes.

#9 7 Thought this was a clever direction to take it in. Although more dramatic than the beginning, this reason for Jason's initial mild reaction would fit.

#10 5 Didn't hold my interest as well as some of the other offerings.

#11 6 Carried through the humorous tone, but a little irritating.
---
#12 7 Also thought this was a reasonable explanation for Jason's initial, mild reaction. Would want to see where this went.
 

A fairly close runner-up, interestingly, did *not* plunge right into the action -- but did plunge immediately into what seemed to me like a significant conflict and something of a mystery. That piece (#10) seemed to establish an interesting character dynamic right off. It didn't address the character's offhand response to the spaceship directly, but to me it did seem consistent so far.

Based on reactions last week and this week, it seems as though the pieces with a young protagonist don't come through well here. Someone pointed out that a young protagonist tends to imply YA fiction, which I suppose is true from a marketing standpoint.

Several people mentioned that they enjoyed humor, but more humorous treatments (despite being potentially very consistent with the original piece) did not grab people as much as the more serious pieces.

Pieces with unusual ideas (including the one we selected) seemed to also get "extra points."

It looks like we may have a special area for the Challenge soon; I'll keep you posted. In the mean time I'll keep making this thread long.

Final scores:
#6 ("Mom, come here!" - "I'm washing dishes,")
Avg rating: 5.6

#7 ("When the hell did that get here?" he mused. "Better not be after the chickens.")
Avg rating: 5.67

#8 ("Jason haphazardly swiped at the dirty dish in his hand while he studied the small craft.")
Avg rating: 6.4

#9 ("He had not heard a thing in the deep silence of the surrounding mountains, not the hushed braking of retro-thrusters ...")
Avg rating: 8.2 (TOP SELECTION)

#10 ("Three days ago, honey," Rita said, not turning from the shopping show she was watching. "I told you I bought it, remember?")
Avg rating: 7.67

#11 ("Of course, as any rational person knows, a spaceship isn't the kind of thing you want in your backyard when you're expecting company.")
Avg rating: 5.4

#12 ("Usually you heard them coming: It's not like they were silent. You'd hear a noise like a vacuum cleaner fighting a cat ...")
Avg rating: 7

#13 ("Strolling downstairs in his BVDs and undershirt, he wondered what to say to the ship's occupants")
Avg rating: 7

Submit your continuation of this story by Thursday, 9 PM EST! It looks as though one submission per person is probably best at this point, since participation has been quite good so far (in order not to make the process overwhelming).

So our story so far goes like this. Sorry to re-post here, but I wanted to put it somewhere where it would be easy to look at the whole thing so far. When our area is ready this will be in a special thread.

Luc

----------------------

It was one of those completely quiet nights in the mountains. The kind of quiet that even the crickets seemed reluctant to disturb. That's why Jason Fine was so surprised when he glanced out the window and saw the spaceship sitting in his backyard.

"When the hell did that get here?" he mused.

He had not heard a thing in the deep silence of the surrounding mountains, not the hushed braking of retro-thrusters whispering through the passes nor the locking of landing struts echoing across the slumbering lake beyond his cabin. True, the transport had not been due for another three Earth hours and his final packing had claimed his attention, but a landing spaceship slipping outside his personal radar meant he was getting sloppy.

He sighed with a well-practiced imitation of an Earthling, feeling once again the conflict of his reluctance to leave the planet and his anxiety to be gone from it, but ended his sigh with a genuinely alarmed intake of breath. The night clouds that broke in a ragged opening around the moon increased the illumination reflecting off the iridescent hull of the spaceship and revealed the fluted edges along its lateral flanges, an identifying feature of a Dawkin stealthcraft.

Somehow they had found him.

He counted it a stroke of luck that he had glanced out the window when he did. With a swiftness that belied his human body, he grabbed only his shoulder pack and sprinted for the front door. They may have already surrounded the cabin, he thought as he hesitated for the smallest of moments, but there's no other way. He left the thought at the door as he sped into the outside darkness toward the lake, the lighter Earth gravity a decided advantage for him.

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited October 20, 2002).]
 

I wonder if there will be more idea overlap this week.

 

Luc
 

(
Team chess reference for those who wonder: Even mediocre single players can usually beat a team opponent, because of the advantage of coherent strategy/planning held within a single mind. It is quite difficult for the team players to visualize/merge/synchronize their individual strategies to form a good team strategy.
)
EP

 

But since "winning the game" (developing a satisfying resolution to the most basic conflicts or problems the story presents) is of enormous importance in storytelling, certainly the entire team needs to start going in the same direction at some point, unless someone is able to wrap up the story all in one 400-word (or OK, 800-word) bit without "help" from previous pieces.

Luc
 

-- Luc

It was one of those completely quiet nights in the mountains. The kind of quiet that even the crickets seemed reluctant to disturb. That's why Jason Fine was so surprised when he glanced out the window and saw the spaceship sitting in his backyard.

"When the hell did that get here?" he mused.

He had not heard a thing in the deep silence of the surrounding mountains, not the hushed braking of retro-thrusters whispering through the passes nor the locking of landing struts echoing across the slumbering lake beyond his cabin. True, the transport had not been due for another three Earth hours and his final packing had claimed his attention, but a landing spaceship slipping outside his personal radar meant he was getting sloppy.

He sighed with a well-practiced imitation of an Earthling, feeling once again the conflict of his reluctance to leave the planet and his anxiety to be gone from it, but ended his sigh with a genuinely alarmed intake of breath. The night clouds that broke in a ragged opening around the moon increased the illumination reflecting off the iridescent hull of the spaceship and revealed the fluted edges along its lateral flanges, an identifying feature of a Dawkin stealthcraft.

Somehow they had found him.

He counted it a stroke of luck that he had glanced out the window when he did. With a swiftness that belied his human body, he grabbed only his shoulder pack and sprinted for the front door. They may have already surrounded the cabin, he thought as he hesitated for the smallest of moments, but there's no other way. He left the thought at the door as he sped into the outside darkness toward the lake, the lighter Earth gravity a decided advantage for him.

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

#14
By the time he reached the edge of the lake, they were after him. He could hear their boots snapping twigs and crunching leaves. You're gonna have to work a whole lot harder to earn those merit badges in stealth, Jason thought. He glanced around, then sprang straight up onto a wide branch of an oak tree, about ten feet off the ground. He shimmied up until he felt comfortably camouflaged by the thick, leafy overhang, then watched from his perch as the soldiers approached.

There were about ten of them, clad in dark camouflage gear and with night scopes on their rifles. They fanned out, searching the area, but of course finding nothing. He remained absolutely still as one pointed his scope up in the direction of his tree.. The soldier's standard-issue human eyes missed him entirely. After about fifteen minutes, they regrouped and moved deeper into the woods, heading around to the east side of the lake.

"I guess that means I go west," Jason sighed, dropping down from the tree. He glanced at his watch. About two and a half hours left until the transport arrived. He reset the homing device in his watchband, and headed off. He made it about a dozen paces before a voice from behind him froze him in his tracks.

"Surprise, Jason," it said. "Assuming that's what you're still calling yourself."

---

#15
His luck held. Jason slipped between the silvery pines just as he heard a heavy metallic scrape.Heavy bodies ground against the stone walkway surrounding the cabin. Distance and the trees soon muffled any sound from that lone dwelling, but in his mind the distinctive tread of Dawkin footsteps beat clear and chilling.

As Jason neared the edge of the lake, an explosion rocked against the mountains. He stumbled to the ground, rolling back to his feet in a fluid movement. Glancing back, he could just make out the flame arching skyward from were the cabin had been.

Too close. Much to close.

Iona had told him how it would be. But had he listened? He wondered if they had taken Iona. That was one of the few trails that could have led the Dawkin to him. Not that it took much.

Suddenly he was aware that he was not alone on the lakeshore. Realizing who it was, he cursed inwardly. She could not be here now. This was not how this was supposed to work out for her.

“Jason? Is that you?” Her soft human voice called out, sounding loud and shrill in the once again still night.

“Hannah, go home.” Jason started moving again.

“I saw the flames. I had to know it you were all right.” The light in her hand bounced wildly as she hurried toward him, her feet squishing in the soft earth near the water. Then she paused, a look of astonishment on her face. “Jason?” she asked, the name trailing away into nothing.

A void filled by the rhythm of heavy footsteps.

---

#16
Behind him he heard the splintering of one of the cabin doors. He knew he had only seconds to reach the lake, under whose depths a labyrinth of tunnels wound into the cores of the mountains where he and the others had done their research. Empty now, the deep mountain corridors had given the Leganty scientists a front row seat to the Dawkin preliminary invasion of Earth.

As he ran, Jason’s thoughts raced as well. If the Dawkin stealthcraft had intercepted the Leganty ship as it left Earth for the Grand Colonial Council, Hedra and Gaff might even now be Dawkin prisoners. Jason felt an involuntary shudder rumble through him, weakening his knees momentarily. Granted, Hedra and Gaff had known the risks before signing up for the Planetary Protection Team, as Jason had, but the thought of Hedra, especially, on that Dawkin stealthcraft next to his cabin chilled him.

Jason’s feet hit the rocky area around the lake. He needed to stay hidden until the transport arrived. Although not a military ship, it would have a pulsar capable of vaporizing the stealthcraft. In this quadrant, all ships carried disintegration weaponry so as not to leave evidence of the existence of life beyond the quadrant. The Council demanded it. If Jason could hide in one of the tunnels beneath the lake until the transport arrived, he would have a chance. If Hedra and Gaff had not slipped past the stealthcraft, they had no chance on Earth, literally, and the thought tore at Jason’s dual hearts.

---

#17
He expected disaster so intensely, he could almost feel the prickle of a stasis charge hit him in the back as he ran, but in reality there was nothing. He could see a faint trace of something in the infrared off to the right, but it was too small and quick to be one of the Dawkin, so he ignored it. Probably a fox. It skittered through the undergrowth, whatever it was, disappearing into the cold columns of the great pine trees.

He covered the half mile to the lake in less than twenty seconds, and paused at the edge for a moment to seal his shoulder pack for the dive. He would dive to the bottom of the lake and go into hibernation, counting on the water-hating Dawkin to give up on finding him within a few days. He’d half-wake every day or so to take a few breaths at the surface and scan for activity. He should swim out to the middle, where --

“Rockculler?” something chirped. It was speaking the Caulish trade language. “Are you Rockculler? What a weird getup.” Jason cursed himself for ignoring the little heat-sign in the woods. There’s no reason the Dawkin Committee in that ship might not have brought help of another species -- and there was no reason to think that the help couldn’t swim if he dove for it. He spun around. He needed to know what he was facing -- but even as he turned, it finally dawned on him that the creature had used his real name. And it certainly didn’t sound like a Dawkin henchman. It raced forward out of the shadows, flicking its way through the undergrowth with its long crabby legs as it floated on a null gravity plate. Of course: A Suplid. Not with the Dawkin at all. Friendly, but absolutely reckless -- at least the males were, and the females stayed on Suplia.

“Quiet!” Jason said in Caulish. He wished he had studied the language better: he needed some pretty strong words right about now. How did you say “moron” in Caulish? Or “dung-headed bastard”?

“What’s the matter? There’s not a human for miles; I scanned before I landed.”

“There are Dawkin, you -- not-wise person!” Jason composed himself. He had been among humans too long; he was getting out of the habit of balancing his spiritual center. He took a couple of deep breaths and found his balance.

“Dawkin?” said the Suplid. “There weren’t any Dawkin with me. I came alone.”

“They must have followed you. Are you in a stealth ship?” Of course it wasn’t; it was a Suplid. Stealth would imply caution -- or common sense.

“Of course not,” it said. “Anyway, I know you have a transport coming, but the Council of Great-Grandmothers back on Suplia sent me to offer you employment.”

“I’m retired.”

“Wait, let me tell you what it is first! You’d only have to stay in that human body for a little while longer, and you’re going to love the perks we’re offering.”

“No. No thank you. Contact me when I’m back on Occa Prime. I have a Brobdignite assistant; it can --”

“No time -- sorry. Actually, it would be ideal if you would come with me right away and let me explain as we’re moving. Our Council --”

There was a heat-trace in the wood, something tall and very hot. “A Dawkin! Get in the water!” Jason hissed.

---

#18
A voice rose from the house, unsteady with age but as loud as ever. “Jason? Come put on a scarf, honey.” He froze under the trees; yes, he had to run from the Dawkin, but no human had any chance of escaping them. A human was as flimsy to a Dawkin as a mound of soap suds.

Was there time? Probably not, but he couldn't leave her to the Dawkin. There were any number of times over the last twenty years when only his association with Agnes, his "adopted aunt," kept him from blowing his human cover entirely.

Agnes moved unsteadily into the floodlight in front of the cabin. His stomachs churning with anxiety, Jason pulled her into the darkness of the trees.

“The Dawkin are here, Aunt Agnes,” he whispered. “We have to get away.”

Agnes turned a tender gaze on him. “Oh, your space creatures again. Poor man, come inside. I’m sure they’ll let you put on your scarf before they capture you.”

Not for the first time, Jason felt impotent fury at Agnes’ unyielding skepticism about “space creatures.” There were times when she almost had him convinced he wasn’t a Drallic courier, but just a confused and bewildered human -- but this was not one of those times.

---

#19
For the thirty-one years he had been on Earth, Jae Sonfinn had been prepared to leave. He had written his suicide intent letter to his human wife on the day he married her, in case he felt the need to disappear without explanation. He kept it in a small pocket of his pack, so that as he left, he only had to leave it on the kitchen table. The Ottrys, named affectionately for that sweet Nyssim female Jae had spent a delicious year with, lay at the bottom of the lake, perpetually ready for take-off. He performed routine maintenance on his radar systems every three months, and he always carried a Brigger stick, just in case he ran into anyone who recognized his face. When someone's name is third on every most-wanted list in the Milky Way, he has to be prepared.

So how had they gotten past his detection? Had Earth made him soft?

It was a possibility Jae did not like to consider. He considered Earth the best decision he had made so far and had a special affinity for the planet. Its virgin natural resources sold hideously well throughout the galaxy--The prime minister herself owned a side-table imbedded with ivory. The scent industry seemed overdeveloped on Earth as well; Jae didn't care much for what the Earthlings called "perfume," but the lilac scent sold especially well among the aristocracy of Fisub. But then the Fisubians never did like bathing much.

Best of all, in all his time on Earth, he hadn't had to do anything really illegal. Yes, landing on Earth was crime enough to cost him a couple million Milkies if anyone found out, but what profitable endeavor didn't involve risks? And Earth had been a VERY profitable endeavor. She had made him more money than any other project so far, except of course blackmailing Gurto Hunida.

In fact, he had been so good and quiet for so long that some even dared to say the formidable Jae Sonfinn had been finally found and lynched. He liked it that way--less nights like this. No matter how prepared Jae had learned to be, he never liked running.

Jae reached the shore of the lake and dived in, so far seeming to have eluded the police. His Brigger stick recharged in his pocket the moment it came in contact with the water; that was good. For four minutes he swam through the cold, black water to the place where the Ottrys lay. He palmed the hatch open and stepped inside, dripping and cold, but thinking the great Jae Sonfinn had once again narrowly escaped capture. Congratulating himself, he reached for a towel.

"Good evening, Mr. Sonfinn," said an unmistakably human voice. He looked up to see a woman standing in the linen closet. Eight more humans stepped out from various hiding places around the cabin, each leveling a Brigger stick in his direction. "Would you like a drink?"

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited October 25, 2002).]
 

Here are some I thought of:
- The Dawkin(s) catch(es) or shoots or stuns him as soon as he emerges from the door. One variation of this: there is a trap right outside the door.
- Someone immediately rescues him, since otherwise he'd be toast

There have to be other ones, but at the moment I'm fresh out. What else could we have done?

Oh -- and it occurs to me that every one of our pieces had him escaping the immediate danger, which from a disinterested perspective was a less likely possibility than immediate capture or ambush. Were we all instinctively avoiding harm to our protagonist out of sympathy for him, or were we putting off the inevitable (sez me) confrontation with the Dawkin(s) for some other reason?

Luc

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited October 25, 2002).]
 

Anyroad, I'd like to hear how others are handling the evaluations as regards their own entry. Not evaluating your own would automatically negate anonymity of voting. Evaluating your own entry entails the bias minefield.

So far, I evaluate the other entries first as though mine wasn't there, then try to honestly as possible see where I think mine belongs in the hierarchy.

Anyone else?

 

I think, coming from my own thoughts as I was writing my entry, that people delayed capture to build more suspense. We aren’t very far into the story at this point – just set an initial premise and establish a bit of character. Several people have set it up for capture in the next segment so it’s still an avenue to explore.

I guess another option would for him to have fought back in some way, instead of running.

[This message has been edited by GZ (edited October 25, 2002).]
 

quote:

---

And by knowing how the author of #102 rated everything, you get to see how people’s writing styles merge with their reading interests, with is sort of interesting if you start comparing things

---

Since some of us have refrained from evaluating two entries, which may or may not include the evaluator's own entry, these kind of comparisons are not possible. Not that they're necessary, just not possible. To do it, everyone would have to put an actual rating on each entry not his own. Maybe rather than just skip an evaluation not ours, we should enter a "0." I don't know.

Also, we never did determine if all the authors would remain anonymous when all was said and done, and that, too might influence voting anonymity and whether or not we should abstain from self evaluation.

P.S. Talk about evaluations. My cat threw up today on my desk and my latest chapter rewrites.

[This message has been edited by Kolona (edited October 25, 2002).]
 

That said, if nobody minds and some people would prefer it, we can make it one of the procedures that we don't rate our own pieces. Should we do that?

In the mean time, fresh ratings for this week!

Luc

#14 -- 5 Liked the ending sentence, but the rest didn’t really catch my
interest.
#16 -- 5 All the thinking is slowing down the action, and I situation
outlined didn’t catch my interest.
#17 -- 7 Suplid may a be fun wrench thrown in things
#18 -- 8 Agnes adds an interesting complication
#19 -- 4 I didn’t care for the sudden name switch to Jae Sonfinn out of the
blue, and while the long internal monologue has good stuff in it, it really
pulls away from the action that the previous section is calling out for.

---

#14 -- 4
Some elements that were interesting to me, but the last line seemed kind of cliched to me, and I didn't understand why there were humans (rather than Dawkin or Dawkins, whatever they were - who unlike normal humans came in a space ship) after Jason

#15 -- 5
I liked that additional characters were beginning to be drawn into the story, but was unhappy that I didn't know who either of the new ones were by the end of the bit. I would have preferred to be introduced properly to one. It seemed highly coincidental that someone he knew was down by the water in the dark. Prose was bolstered with lots of adjectives and adverbs, which kind of gave it a "trying real hard" feel to me.

#16 -- 7
Liked the situation that was being depicted (scientists watching the invasion of earth) and the idea of tunnels underneath the mountain and the two other characters being somewhere out there. Use of the word "pulsar" (considering its astronomical definition) was weird. I was disappointed that it seemed to be implied that Hedda was a female by the 'a' on the end of her name, a romance language convention showing up in an entirely alien language -- also that Jason's race seems to consider females more vulnerable, like some Earth cultures. True, Hedda might not be a female, but it seemed to be presented that way.

#19 -- 7
Liked the character and some of the fleshing out of the background, particularly the fact that we now know why he's on the run, and from whom. Had trouble with some of the exposition, which slowed the story to fill in information. Don't like the person (the character is interesting to me, but stopped having any sympathy for him when I got to the suicide note part, because his "wife" will probably be screwed up for the rest of her life from that and it seems a rotten thing to do). Was slightly thrown off by switching from calling the character "Jason" to "Jae," and actually had trouble believing that his name in his own language was "Jae Sonfinn." Any alien language that's easy to represent in English is a bit of a belief issue, but we tend to suspend disbelief on those because other techniques are so much more cumbersome - unless the writer brings our attention to it, as is the case for me with "Jae Sonfinn."

The last line of this also felt kind of cliched to me.

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited October 25, 2002).]
 

quote:

---

Since some of us have refrained from evaluating two entries, which may or may not include the evaluator's own entry, these kind of comparisons are not possible.

---

Actually, why, excluding your own entry, would there be any reason not to evaluate one of the segments? I’ve wondered about that…

Also, mathematically, putting a 0 for a rating and just skipping it have drastically different consequences when it comes to averaging out the votes.

 

Got some more ratings for us. Here we go:

14 -- 8 Liked the use of the lighter Earth gravity enabling Jason to leap into the tree. Liked his self-assuredness. Confused about the human eye reference, since the soldier was using a scope on his weapon. Also wondered why pursuers were human, not Dawkin.

15 -- 5 The heavy bodies grinding against the stone walkway threw me--at first thought they were being dragged. Began pretty well, but lost its sense of urgency. A soft voice may be loud in a quiet setting, but shrill? Also a soft voice speaking wildly didn't jive. Thought the silvery pines went well with the metallic scrape, a nice use of a similarity as a contrast (one metal good--helps hide Jason; one metal bad--indicates his pursuers)

17 -- 4 The Suplid too much like Jar-Jar Binks, consequently too annoying. The water-hating Dawkin a nice touch, but didn't inspire me.

18 -- 6 A different approach, but if Jason was concerned about Aunt Agnes, why did he run out and leave her in the cabin in the first place? He had to have known she was there, her being old and all. The extra stomach(s)
a good reminder he was an alien. Could have been written tighter.

19 -- 3 Name change could have used an aka tag (otherwise known as); wasn't sure Jae was our Jason at first. Too many odd names--a personal bugaboo for me with a lot of scienc fiction. Ending confusing. I thought the Ottrys was on the lake bottom, but somehow Jae ended up in the cabin??? Jae not a sympathetic character, so he lost lots of points, although connecting Jae with the illegal ivory trade was a good way to show his despicable side. Didn't click for me.
 

Luc
 

I'm tempted to say maybe we should extend the time limits, an idea that crossed my mind earlier when I was scrambling to get an excerpt written and submitting what I knew wasn't my very best, and again when I realized the evaluations were a little like a minor meatgrinder because they're as off the cuff as most of our entries and tend to be a little rough.

I changed my mind, though, because, like the writing exercise where you put pen to paper and don't lift it till a certain amount of time has passed or till you're done writing, I have found this whole game quite valuable.

First, the discipline of deadlines can only be a good habit for writers.

Second, as writers we need to develop a thick skin to take writing criticism, and this group should be a safe place to give and receive, so to speak (although I've determined to try to say something positive for each entry).

Third, personally I've already gleaned an opening for a story I wouldn't have had if I hadn't written it for the first segment of our game. I never turned it in because found I wanted to develop it myself eventually, and I vascillated about it till the last minute so doing a second entry wasn't possible. (Then again, what might I have come up with in two hours?)

A similar thing happened this time, with the mid paragraph of what had been my original entry. This time, I recognized my quandry sooner and rewrote part of the piece for submission, but it wasn't as good as the first. Still, I got something in and I have an interesting little excerpt to use in my book or another story. I wouldn't have had it without having been under the gun to produce something.

No, I say we agreed to this, and although there may be a few things to work out (like all of us not evaluating our own entries and everyone submitting only one entry to make it easier on all of us), it's surely far too early in the game to throw in the towel. (Oh, the cliches!) For one thing, all the votes aren't even in yet. For another, I find at least two of the entries worthy of continuing.

Sorry about the soapbox.

P.S. Oh, yes. Luc's concern about losing momentum is a legitimate one. Also, the precedent we'd set for ourselves if we back out of this story line -- if we give up each time we get flummoxed, I for one would find it discouraging. Why put in the effort if the story can be terminated at any point? I vote we carry through to resolution.

[This message has been edited by Kolona (edited October 26, 2002).]
 

...although I do believe we should finish this story line, what if we do the next one differently? Instead of submitting segments to be evaluated, why not have one of us write first, then hand it off to the next, and so on? Then decide which way we like best. We can decide whether we want to do it anonymously or not and we can evaluate or not. I think I prefer how we're doing it now, but I'm game either way.

Just a thought.

[This message has been edited by Kolona (edited October 26, 2002).]
 

However, I also think Kolona's round robin approach may work well next time. I'd definitely be open to trying it.
 

#15: 7 Interesting set up, but a little confusing. I'm curious to see what comes next.
#16: 9 I liked this; thought it forwarded a lot of storyline in a small space.
#17: 6 Thought this was fun, but may get a little silly if followed
#18: 5 The dialogue was good, but this wasn't so much my cup of tea, didn't make sense that he ran out on his aunt
#19: 4 I didn't like the unexplained name change, nor the change of direction in our hero's character

 

quote:

---

Anyone can rate any or all of the pieces submitted. You don’t have to have been involved before, and you don’t have to have written a submission of your own.

---

By the same token, you can jump into the game at any time, or omit a segment, since we all do have lives outside Hatrack.
 

But for now, here are our ratings for this week. Perhaps reflecting that there was not one particular example that rang everyone's bell, there was a lot of variation in the ratings.

People seemed to give lower ratings for pieces that were confusing, inconsistent, or that did not inspire them. More points seemed to be given for pieces that engaged curiosity and moved the story along briskly, in an exciting way.

Final, average ratings were:
#14: 5.67 ("By the time he reached the edge of the lake, they were after him ...")

#15: 5.67 ("His luck held. Jason slipped between the silvery pines ...")

#16: 7 ("Behind him he heard the splintering of one of the cabin doors. He knew he had only seconds to reach the lake ...")

#17: 5.67 ("He expected disaster so intensely, he could almost feel the prickle of a stasis charge ...")

#18: 6.33 ("A voice rose from the house, unsteady with age but as loud as ever.")

#19: 4.5 ("For the thirty-one years he had been on Earth, Jae Sonfinn had been prepared to leave.")

The top rated piece, which will add to our story, was the only one to garner two positive ratings (seven or above). It also got one so-so rating. All others had two or more so-so ratings. Only four people participated in the ratings -- the least yet! What happened? Did people not get around to rating? Were we less inspired to rate them because there wasn't a particular piece that floated people's boats?

Here's a realization that was interesting to me, anyway. All of the pieces except for the highest-rated one were basically in the following structure: Jason escapes with his enemies hot on his heels, then meets someone who throws a wrench in the works -- friend, foe, or somewhere in between.

Did anyone notice any other trends or anything else going on?

Any other things we didn't explore?

For the pieces to which you reacted negatively (whether or not you actually submitted ratings), were you turned off by the encounter or the character that was introduced?

Since the story's getting a little long, I'll no longer post it here, but now I'm maintaining the latest version at http://www.realmis.com/wdc -- just click to see it. Please submit your piece to continue the story by 9PM EST Thursday. Thanks!

Luc

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited October 27, 2002).]
 

Just because the story is getting long enough that posting it here each week has gotten awkward.

Sadly, no high-speed Internet access is available here (we're stuck with slightly-better-than-dialup satellite), so for instance it has really been slowing down my access to this topic. :/

Once our separate board here on Hatrack is available, we can probably manage the whole thing more easily, and entirely on site.

Luc
 

Luc

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited October 30, 2002).]
 

quote:

---

Once our separate board here on Hatrack is available, we can probably manage the whole thing more easily, and entirely on site.

---

I guess I don't understand the particulars of sites. I thought the net was, for all practical purposes, limitless. But as long as we're coming back on site here I guess we can tread water for a while.

Okeedoke, the new pieces are in. More possible directions here than you might think! Looking forward to seeing ratings and comments. Also, lately we've been seeing a more modest number of submissions each week, so if people are interested in writing two pieces in a given week, that's probably fine (although I'll still keep only the favorite if we have too many submissions).

Enjoy!
Luc

#20
He launched himself in a long, flat dive that drove him deep into the water, where startled fish swirled away through the murk. The human eyes he was wearing were practically useless in the cold darkness of the lake, so giving a mental command to his in-body computer, he switched on his sonar, and in a few moments the shape of the lake bottom superimposed itself over his vision in wavering blue lines. Swimming along the bottom of the lake, he soon found his way to the entrance, and a moment later he surfaced in the entry pool.

“There you are,” chirped a voice from behind him, and at the same time long-fingered hands clamped around his upper arms, yanking him out of the pool. He looked up to see a two massive Dawkins, one peon and one lieutenant, tiny heads perched on bodies that were like wildly overgrown catcher’s mitts.

“Damn you bastards,” Jason muttered.

“Aw, don’t be a sore loser,” said the lieutenant. “Look, we brought you a friend to play with.” Jason looked where the lieutenant was pointing and saw Gaff, frozen in a running posture, held up precariously by another Dawkin peon. They had flash-frozen, not killed him -- so they wanted information. Where was Hedda? Jason didn’t dare ask, in case they didn’t know about her yet.

“Come on,” said the lieutenant. “We got a nice freeze chamber just waiting for you. We’ve been watching you guys, did you know that?” He laid a limbbinder between Jason's fake human shoulder blades, and Jason felt his arms pulled around to the back, where they were fixed in place by the limbbinder. Prospects of escape were disappearing rapidly. The lieutenant gave Jason a push, and they made their way up through the labyrinth toward, Jason assumed, a Dawkin stealthcraft.

He was more than surprised to see a full-sized Dawkin troop ship. What were they -- ?

The lieutenant grinned, his sharp little teeth sticking out in all directions. “You thought you had another couple of months, didn’t you? Misinformation, pal. Boy, did you guys take the bait.” In the distance Jason could see another Dawkin ship, and in another direction, yet another. All troop carriers. Which were inevitably supported by Eradicators --

In the distance, a particle beam split the sky, and a massive tower of smoke and flame burst up approximately where downtown had been.

“You guys think you’re so superior,” the Dawkin continued, marching Jason onto the troop carrier. “Such big brains, all this science. You should have stuck to that stuff and not started messing with espionage and warfare. What do you think we do all day, anyway?” They clanked down a cylindrical passage, heading deep into the ship. “War belongs to the Dawkins. If we want to discover a new way to disintegrate Gruuba snot, we’ll call on you. Otherwise, maybe you should mind your own damn business. Hi, Hedda.”

Jason jerked his head up, startled. There was Hedda, although she was hurrying by, hiding her face. What was she doing loose on a Dawkin ship?

Oh.

But surely he wasn’t that stupid. Surely he hadn’t fallen in love with a traitor?

“Boy,” said the Dawkin with relish. “Are you stupid.”

---

#21
Jason was about to dive into the lake when the Dawkin team intercepted him. He whirled around to face the five as they came bursting out of the woods, reaching out of old habit for the disabler that unfortunately wasn't in his belt.

"Move and die!" snapped the Dawkin team leader, brief and to the point as ever. The huge, black uniformed creature leveled his weapon at Jason's chest. Behind the face mask that enabled it to breath the Earth's otherwise poisonous air, Jason saw the Dawkin's large white eyes narrow. "Where?" it demanded in broken English, jabbing an appendage at the lake.

"Where what?" asked Jason, raising his eyebrows in a show of innocence. "I was just going for a late night swim.

The Dawkin leader waved his free appendage. Immediately, the rest of the team moved forward and surrounded Jason. "Hey, what is this?" he demanded in a tone of voice he hoped projected human fear and innocent indignation. "What are you things anyway? I don't ... "

"Shut it!" snapped the Dawkin. "Fool no one. You are third and final. Is here or is not?"

So, they did have Hedra and Gaff, after all. And here he was, standing right at the entrance to the observatory, practically inviting the Dawkins for a guided tour. Well, if they aren't buying the ordinary human act anyway, Jason decided, shifting into an offensive stance, I may as well show them who they are dealing with.

He swung at the Dawkin on his right, nailing it in its sensitive midsection. The creature grunted and doubled over. At the same time, Jason jumped into the air and delivered a roundhouse kick into the face mask of the Dawkin behind him, cracking the shield. It gave an eerie, strangled cry as it inhaled oxygen, then fell backward to writhe on the ground. Landing, Jason dropped to his knees and delivered a combination of blows to the insides of the third Dawkin's calves, where he knew they stored their genitals. The wounded creature emitted a howl of rage and pain as it collapsed.

As Jason sprang back to his feet to face the fourth Dawkin, he caught a glimpse of movement out of the corner of his eye. Before he could dive out of the way, the Dawkin team leader fired his weapon, hitting Jason in the side. The blast knocked him to the ground, the searing pain making him gasp for breath. Then the Dawkin team leader's face mask filled his blurred, rapidly-narrowing line of sight. "Take it," he heard it command. Then the Dawkin, and everything else, faded away into darkness.

---

#22
After a few quick, splashing steps, he was underwater, his mouth open as his oral cavity gills blocked his throat, transitioning his body to the aqueous environment. As usual, he felt sorry for the limitations imposed on Earthlings by their own bodies, especially since so much water covered Earth. The wonderful chill of the mountain lake played on his skin, and had it been a normal dive to the tunnels, he would have "taken the long way" as was his custom, and etched watery spirals of continuous figure eights all the way to the tunnel entrance. But this was no normal dive.

The lake was deep and the tunnel entrance well camouflaged on the lake bottom, where Jason manipulated the water lock control to let himself in. Once through the aqua chamber and into the air-filled corridor, he dropped to his knees and dug into his backpack, bringing out his communication unit. Activating it, he watched as it sorted through the communication traffic in the quadrant, searching for the lone signal on which his life depended-and possibly all of Earth.

There. He murmured the Leganty jargon that identified him to the transport and they to him. Without even a sigh of relief, he hurried into his question.

"Did Hedra and Gaff make it?"

"Your parents are safely en route to the Council," the answering voice said. "Their reports were forwarded there once they were out of Dawkin intercept range." The voice warbled, akin to a human laugh. "The Dawkin will suffer more than censure this time."

Jason heard the unfinished thought in the odd silence that followed. "But what?" he said with a sudden suspicion.

"Well,"-the slight hesitation gave Jason a millisecond to prepare himself for what he knew was coming-"Gaff thinks you can do it, and not because you're his son, and Hedra says you're probably the only one who can."

---

#23
[This piece, it turns out, didn't come through in e-mail properly. We'll be posting the real version ASAP. Feel free to rate some now, some later if that suits you. -- Luc]

---

#24
It was only a moment of reflection, a short time to collect his thoughts, but it was too long. A keening, rasping sound seemed to come from everywhere around him, and the next thing he knew he was floating in a Dawkin containment aquarium, his human "body" stripped from him, his methane pack gone. Soon, he knew, he would start to feel dizzy, and if he didn’t get some kind of methane within the next three to four hours, brain damage was very likely.

Around him were crowded members of the Dawkin Conquest Conglomerate, at least nine or ten species, arguing in loud voices as they always did. Some dictated memoranda into their translating machines; others gibbered over profit figures. He felt like a picture someone put on the wall, but that nobody was very interested in.

A Tarnatian noticed him and poked a neighbor of the same species with a flexible spine. “He’s up,” he said in Dawkin. “The suspension field must have worn off already. That was pretty quick.”

“We in Competitive Intelligence suspect the Leganty have been making genetic improvements throughout their member species,” drawled his neighbor, watching Jason with idle curiosity. “They’re hardy, but it isn’t natural. And I doubt they have any more resistance than anyone else to a neuroelectrical scan.” The Tarnations turned one eye stalk each to watch Jason’s reaction, wrinkling their gills in amusement.

Jason grimaced. Neuroelectrical scans were a great way to find out everything a creature knew, if you don’t mind turning the brain to mush in the process. More than ever he hoped Gaff and especially Hedra hadn’t been intercepted, considering what Hedra knew. He wished he had never called them to pull him out -- or that he had called them sooner.

Then a brilliant blue beam of light punched through the room and began moving in a straight line, vaporizing everything in its path. The previous semi-chaos of the room exploded into real panic, filling the chamber with screeches, barks, and ululations as Dawkin members shoved each other out of the way in a mad rush to escape. Jason watched in awe as “indestructible” Dawkin field computers vanished without so much as a puff of steam. The plane generator that was holding the aquarium together was destroyed instantaneously when the beam hit it, and Jason spilled out into the chamber along with the water-and-ammonia solution he had been floating in.

The bottom three legs of a Memchite had been separated from the rest of the body, and from the leg belts on these Jason tore two bulbs of methane, taking a quick whiff of one before leaping over the milling crowd toward the exit. His first jump brought him about thirty feet closer to the door, and a second brought him the rest of the way. He grabbed hold of one of the upper leg belts of a still-living Memchite and was carried through the door, at which point he sprung loose onto the grass.

He was in unfamiliar surroundings, surrounded by low, human corporate buildings. Seeing a line of trees about half a mile distant, he lowered his head and sprinted toward that bit of shelter. As he ran he turned his head 180 degrees to look back at what he had emerged from. It was as he feared: A full-sized Dawkin destroyer.

A Winged Amian, only two feet tall, was the only one of the Dawkin members as fast as Jason was with his Leganty enhancements, and it kept pace with him until they both reached the woods. At that point Jason grabbed it where its thorax and abdomen met and squeezed. It wouldn’t be a pretty murder, but he wasn’t about to be dragged back into captivity because he was unwilling to kill a giant bug.

“Stop! We must flee! Stop!” choked the Amian. “It is the Wave! They are attacking!”

It was harder to strangle the Amian than Jason thought, and he had no idea what the Wave was, so he eased his grip just enough that the Amian could breath. Was this some kind of trick? Then again, that blue beam was like nothing he had ever heard of before. What kind of weapon could cut through a Dawkin destroyer? Even the pulsar-class excavator the Leganty scientists used wouldn’t penetrate the gravity shielding of a destroyer.

“The what?” said Jason.

“The Wave! It has been kept secret from you, but now you must know. The Leganty must ally with the Dawkin to repulse the Wave. They are horrible! They wreak destruction wherever they go!”

“Sounds like a taste of your own medicine to me.”

“It is no medicine!” cried with Amian. “We Dawkin seek only to annex, to acquire. The Wave seek always to exterminate! No one has seen them; no one has lived to report their nature, but everywhere they have gone there has been no life left behind. No life at all!”

“You Dawkin are a plague,” growled Jason. “You’re dreaming if you think you’ll get any help from the Leganty.”

“Then they will hunt us down separately,” moaned the Amian, “and we will all die.”

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited October 31, 2002).]

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited November 01, 2002).]
 

21: 5
Wasn't inspired by this, I guess because it was mostly just action that was unlikely to influence the plot. Wondered why the weapon wasn't lethal or disabling rather than just damaging (especially since the Dawkin had said "Move and die!". Wondered why Jason would attack nearby Dawkins when there was a weapon aimed at him. Wondered why weapon was not fired when he first attached.

22: 7
Gaff & Hedra being parents didn't seem quite to gibe with the story before. Wondered why Jason didn't see anyone when he arrived in the tunnels. If Gaff & Hedra were coming with the transport, didn't understand why they had turned around and left (maybe because of the Dawkin coming, but this wasn't made clear). Liked the sense of Jason having a very difficult job coming up but didn't like not being told right away what it was. Idea of parents being involved was interesting to me.

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited November 01, 2002).]
 

#23
A cold draft rippled the waters of the lake and it shimmered in the moonlight. For a moment, everything seemed in motion. Jason stopped.

“Stay focused,” he breathed. “You’re no good to anyone dead.” Or worse, captured by the Dawkin. He pushed the thought from his mind as another breeze shook the water. Something jerked against the breeze to his left. He tasted the air. Whatever it was had moved downwind. Jason cocked an eyebrow—momentarily noting how engrained Earthling habits had become to him—and took a few steps toward the lake. The thing moved again. He closed his eyes. It was large, and it produced far less heat than anything indigenous for its size. The lake was only twenty strides away, if he pushed himself. Twenty strides were six for a Dawkin. But there was no other way.

Jason took off, leaping from stone to mud to stone as fast as his legs could carry him. The Dawkin pursued on its well-muscled appendages. Jason glanced to his right as another turned in to join the chase. He felt a third to his left. Almost there. A shadow rose and engulfed Jason’s own in the moonlight as the lead Dawkin crossed over his body. It stopped ahead of him, grinding its exoskeleton into the stone as it turned to face him, and crouched to block his way.

A Dawkin was an intelligent creature, and strong, but even it had its weaknesses. Even as it stood upon its nine powerful legs, bending its body down and chittering—a noise that sounded more like bones splintering against metal than a Common Language dialect—out of its thick, poisonous beak, its skin grew redder and more boiled from contact with Earth air. Jason tried to make out its words, but his interest lie more with the water, now only a small leap away. The Dawkin pointed to his pack with one of its forward legs and snipped at it. Jason moved to remove it. One strap, then the other, then a dive and a roll beneath the creature and he was in the water, bag still in hand. It made a loud, grinding cry of protest and jabbed at him with its hind leg. The leg reeled back after a moment, the water on Jason’s body too strong for it. Jason clawed at the stone beneath him, propelling himself forward until the water was deep enough to cover him.

The Leganty laboratory did not begin under the lake, but approximately two trirans—or 3.7 miles, as Jason had become familiar expressing it—away under the first of the nearby mountains. However, in one of the storage facilities along the primary corridor to it sat a cache Jason had established his first few years on Earth. It had been a refuge for him when he needed to get away from the Earthling lifestyle for a bit, and it was there that Jason went when he passed the airlock at the bottom of the lake.

The hallway was a dark, quiet, and low place—the perfect height for a Leganty unburdened with its human disguise. Jason squatted as he ran down the hall, his shoes squeaking and leaking water with every step. He reached the thin but sturdy door to the storage room in minutes. Its rounded form rose only to his chest as he punched in the access code to enter. Denied. The word flashed in Common as a few harsh orange dashes. Jason tapped it in again. Denied. He pulled the shoulder pack from his back and removed a small silvery device. Luckily this was a low security door. The giladin buzzed as it charged, then with one blast, the lock disconnected from the door and clattered to the ground. Jason smiled, pulled the door open, and entered.

The room was a small rectangular nook crowded with shelves and boxes of all sizes filled with everything from Leganty lab equipment to janitor cleaning tools. Strewn atop were his own possessions. The lights were already on, bathing all his trinkets, mementos of a distant home world, in a bluish glow. Strange, he thought as he let the door close behind him. I didn’t think I left the lights on…though it has been a while since I’ve been here. Jason shook it from his mind as he pulled a large storage chest from a nearby shelf. Within were a few old uniforms, the largest barely wide enough for his human form. He patted the bluish cloth against his clothes to dry them—no use changing. He replaced the chest and moved to the back of the room. Two chairs sat amid the clutter and between them stood a small table with a small brassy plate on it. Jason sat in the larger chair and picked up the plate. A 3D image materialized above it. He, Hedra, and Gaff on their first day on Earth—he and Hedra decked out with human suits being held up in the air by the sturdy Gaff. Jason smiled weakly. Where were they now? He set the plate down and the image fizzled away. What if they were on the Dawkin ship? Could I have saved them if I stayed at the cabin? No, he reasoned. I would have been captured by the Dawkin. I would be exactly where they are now. Where they could be now. They could also be safe on the Leganty ship, and I would have been captured for nothing. Best to have run. They would have run.

The faint buzz of a giladin charge issued from behind a pile of storage bins, turning Jason instantly from his thoughts. He charged his own and cursed himself for his carelessness. Someone was in the room. Well, if it is a fight they want, thought Jason, then I’m game. He dived at the bins and threw them aside. His jaw dropped—a sign of astonishment both to Leganty and Earthling.

“Gaff!”

 

Luc

23: 6
Some of the descriptions were hard for me to picture, but I liked "grinding its exoskeleton into the stone" even though it fell in this category for me. Ultimately I had trouble understanding what was going on from moment to moment. Had trouble believing he swam far while still wearing shoes and that he didn't suspect anything when he went to the storeroom. I liked the idea of his cache and the bit of backstory that was developed here.
 

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited November 03, 2002).]
 

#20 -- 5

#21 -- 7

#23 -- 3 My notes from the 1st brief posting read: "odd phrasing, didn't
understand what J did to open the door, caverns are /empty/." I seem to have
less trouble with the door thing in the version posted 2 days later.
But--doesn't square with what's come so far since not only were the tunnels
empty, but the Grand Colonial Council demanded leaving no evidence of "life
beyond the quadrant" behind.

#24 -- 6
 

Luc
 

#20: 8 Like the traitor twist. Fit well with what we have so far. Want to
see how Jason will respond.
#21: 5 Didn’t really suck me further into the story. An obvious conclusion
to the business started at the cabin.
#22: 6 Somehow Hedda and Graff being his parents didn’t sit right with how
they have been presented before.
#23: 4 Didn’t like how Jason didn’t identify it was a Dawkin clearly.
Seems like he is very familiar with them from what came before. Didn't
advance story much.
#24: 5 Found the pace to be slow. Wave concept wasn’t interesting to me.

Also, we have tie-breaker ratings.

20: 6-Humorous
22: 5-An interesting take that Hedra and Gaff are his parents; a little sparse otherwise
23: 6-Nicely done, good cliffhanger
24: 7-A little confusing with all the species names, but an exciting segment

So that gives us these average ratings:

#20: 6.33 (highest rating)
#21: 5.67
#22: 6.00
#23: 4.75
#24: 6.00

This is fairly close, but we can go ahead with #20 if there are no objections. Let's consider it not fixed in stone until noon tomorrow, in case anyone would like to suggest a different course of action, since admittedly 6.33 is a pretty low top rating, especially when two others are close behind it.

So I'd suggest we go ahead and take #20 as our next section and move ahead with that, but don't feel like we absolutely must do that if someone would like to do otherwise. I'd also like to leave it open for any other ratings to come in for another hour or so, just in case that changes things.

Hope this flexible structure thing is cool with everyone. Let's see if Hedra is really the traitor she's sounding like at the moment.

Luc
 

quote:

---

I'd also like to leave it open for any other ratings to come in for another hour or so, just in case that changes things.

Hope this flexible structure thing is cool with everyone. Let's see if Hedra is really the traitor she's sounding like at the moment.

---

Except for tie-breakers, I don't think flexibility is a good thing. Who better than writers should understand that words mean things? Deadline means just that, no? I know some Floridians think differently, but when do we stop if not at the first tie-breaker? We don't need grey areas that can be argued.

TTFN & lol

Cosmi
 

Hmm, no consensus is emerging easily, so I'd like to say "Let's continue this way," and if anyone really hates the idea, we can have some more discussion as we're moving forward and possibly revise our plans.

Cosmi, I'm afraid this direction doesn't take your point of view into account very well, but since we don't seem to have a strong consensus for changing the guidelines, let's stick to them for now and go with #20 as our story continuation -- with the realization that at least talking about editing the story might be productive down the road.

Looking forward to taking this current week apart, especially finding out why we had such low or mixed ratings! Is this a natural thing as the story becomes more constrained and people were not as excited about the possibilities that get thrown by the wayside as we get a clearer idea of what's going on? Or were the pieces this time around not as effective as some of the earlier ones?

Oh, and another question: Are we writing our pieces not to carry the story forward in the most powerful way, but rather to surprise each other with twists? I mean, twists are fun, but are we concentrating on them to the exclusion of deeper elements? I'm not saying we are, but the question crosses my mind.

More promptly. The updated version of the story is up at http://www.realmis.com/wdc.

Luc

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited November 04, 2002).]
 

Here are some responses (sans ratings) to last week's pieces from one of our participants:

20: the sonar bit was neat at the beginning, but i didn't care for the rest of it. the Dawkin were too unbelievable. i didn't like the mystery of Hedra's location being resolved so soon either.

21: good action sequence. didn't much care for him playing human, but it wasn't entirely out of place. the Dawkin said "move and die," and when he was finally shot (which, by the way, took a while considering he was unarmed and they were all pointing guns at him), it doesn't sound like he died....

22: i like the character development when Jason was underwater. i also enjoyed Gaff and Hedra being Jason's parents. i didn't expect it, but really, it fits. the only part that made me cringe was the leaving out of his mission--it seems like a cheap trick for suspense. we've experienced everything he's experienced until that point, why not this?

24: i had to reread this one to really get a sense of what happened at the beginning. i couldn't really picture where Jason ended up either. i think this entry has merit, but it tries to accomplish too much too quickly. i've seen this in many of the other entries as well (past and present). it makes me wonder if we're not compromising content in order to fit in enough plot to be thought of as "effectively advancing the story." i don't like a lot of description, but i need more than this provided.
 

Here are some comments on the last round of pieces & ratings from one participant.

Luc

Two comments have been made about the #22 segment cutting off. Wasn't the
idea to simply further the story along however long or short we wish?

quote:

---

can be anything from about thirty words to 1,000 words, but we're
shooting for something in the neighborhood of 100-200 words. Don't worry
about finishing the scene or stopping at a logical stopping place: Instead,
break it off anywhere that works for you

---

Isn't it a good idea to leave a clear opening for the next segment to work
from?

 

Just a thought....
 

Luc
 

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited November 07, 2002).]
 

Original post:
Sorry about the delay. Here are this week's pieces! Don't forget, your rankings are valuable information ... and early is good!

Luc

#25
Jason contemplated his stupidity as he stumbled along in front of the Dawkin through busy troop ship corridors. Lost in thoughts of escape, he almost missed the clues. The Dawkin behind him had tensed. Jason pushed his mind to catch up, and realized the corridor they were now walking was empty, strangely so. The flash and hiss of a plasma weapon made him flinch, but the sound and smell of the Dawkin deflating and collapsing behind him quickly squelched the instinctive reaction and triggered another. Covering his nose and mouth, Jason whirled around, searching.

"Stand still, Jason, unless you want me to shoot you instead of the limbbinder."

"Hedra?" The limbbinder shuddered with the flash of energy Hedra directed to it and Jason eased it to the floor to keep it from clanking down. "I thought
you-"

"Turned traitor?" She rolled her eyes, and he heard it coming before she said it. "Boy, are you stupid."

Jason flinched again. He was beginning to hate that word. He tugged the plasma out from under the Dawkin's limp arm and brought it up, leveling the weapon at Hedra and not believing he was doing it. "Maybe, Hedra. But I saw. And I heard. You're on a first name basis with the Dawkin."

Hedra grimaced, a human expression Jason found amusing on her. Okay, he admitted to himself with annoyance. Cute.

"Jason, you're as stupid as the Dawks," Hedra said in a stage whisper heavy with exasperation. "They walk their copycat android by you, and you sink without even coming up for air three times." She pushed his plasma away and motioned for him to follow her. "Stupid Dawks didn't even get my name right," she mumbled as she pulled off the cover and slipped into an access shaft about a half-meter up the wall.

Jason stood dumbfounded. Quickly, he thought back, then groaned inwardly. He had picked up a Dawkin mindbit without realizing it. He really was getting sloppy not to have noticed Hedra's wrong name in his consciousness. Hedra's name. Of all people.

"Well…come on!" The cute grimace flashed again as Hedra peered out of the shaft.

Jason hurried after her, replacing the shaft's covering panel behind him before she could use the "S" word again. Inside, he squeezed past four Dawkin bodies that resembled deflated Earth puffer fish. Only the core of a Dawkin was solid; the great mass was a hellish mixture of toxic gases. Kill enough Dawkins at close range and you could still lose the fight. "You've been busy," he said to Hedra.

She had turned a corner ahead of him, and her voice echoed back to him in the metal shaft. "Not busy enough. They got Gaff."

"I know. I saw him. Frozen. Where're we headed?" Hedra turned another corner, as though she knew where she was going. "Freeze chambers. I marked the way."

Jason had noticed the small scorch marks here and there along the walls of the shaft, but had not attributed them to anything. Boy, am I stupid! He hurried to catch up to Hedra, shaking his head at himself. He was a brilliant scientist, a first-rate alien weapons expert, and a former Colonial Squadron Commander, yet Hedra, whether in Leganty or Earthling female form, turned him into a lovesick stupid blob of protoplasm.

"Okay, weapons man," Hedra said, coming to a stop. She twisted, turning around in the meter-high shaft to face him, and flicked her head to one side. "Which is best for the job?"

In a smaller shaft off the main one, Jason saw a pile of Dawkin weapons-plasmas, hand lasers, rapid-fires, even a couple low-volume incendiaries. "You have been busy. How did you manage all this?"

"The Dawks helped, actually. Once they introduced their little android Hedda, they inadvertently gave me unrestricted access." Hedra grinned and, although it could have been the dim light in the shaft, Jason thought she blushed when their eyes met.

Suddenly he didn't feel so stupid. "Describe the layout of the freeze chambers," he said, hearing the steely resolve of his voice echo off the metal walls of the shaft. He pocketed a hand laser and an incendiary, then hefted a rapid-fire. Dawkins may be stupid, but they have excellent weaponry. He glanced at Hedra and smiled, knowing his bout of stupidity was over. It was time to defrost Gaff.

---

#26
But that was unbelievable. He knew Hedra better than that. There must be some other explanation. “Hedra!” shouted Jason. “Hedra, it’s me, Forell!” That was his given name, although he had grown more or less used to thinking of himself as “Jason.”

“Stop,” said Hedra to the Dawkins.

“I don’t intend to --” started the Lieutenant.

“Oh, shut your trap,” she said. “Don’t make me revoke your looting privileges.”

The lieutenant stretched his mouth in displeasure, but said nothing more, and jerked Jason roughly to a stop. Hedra came and looked up at his human face.

“Who did you say you were?” she said.

“Forell,” Jason said in disbelief. “Forell! From the Leganty Earth protection project!”

“Forell,” she said meditatively. “Forell, Forell. I don’t -- oh, hold it. I remember you. You’re that guy who had a crush on me.”

Jason felt blood rush into his human face in embarassment. “Hedra, you always --”

“I always what? I always restrained myself from strangling you when you tagged along after me everywhere like a puppy? I always bore your sickening flattery with good grace?”

“But I thought --”

“No,” Hedra said sharply. “I don’t think you did. I think you just let your gametal gland do all the thinking for you.” Maddeningly, Jason was still mesmerized by the almost-subliminal beckoning of her pheromones. Her softly undulating gil sacs drew his eye away from her face even though he willed himself to look directly in her eyes.

“By the Gods’ corpses,” she said. “Can’t you keep your eyes off my gill sacs for two minutes?” She turned away in disgust.

“You done?” said the lieutenant sullenly.

“Gods, yes,” said Hedra. “Go ahead and freeze him.”

---

#27
He sorted through the possibilities in his mind on the way to freeze chamber. Yes, he had to admit that at least in theory, it was possible that Hedra was a traitor. But what else? Perhaps she was being impersonated, either to fool the Dawkins or to fool him. If she was being impersonated to fool the Dawkins, that had to be a good sign; if him, it meant there was someone much more subtle than the Dawkins at work. What else?

A clone? It hardly seemed likely, but yes, someone could have done an accelerated growth clone, which would probably mean that it was going to be used to impersonate Hedra somewhere else -- like with the Leganty scientists still hiding out in Prague and Johannesburg. Or she might be being used as a decoy traitor to the Dawkins.

In which case, was the frozen Gaff the real Gaff, or a clone?

What else? She could be pretending to betray the Leganty in order to penetrate the Dawkin command structure. That didn’t seem too far-fetched. But then, if she hadn’t given them some valuable information already, why did they trust her? Or did they trust her?

She could even be a prisoner, one they were acting familiar with. In hopes of getting her friendly with the Dawkin and turning her traitor?

Too many possibilities; Jason had to try to find out the truth. Only then could he act.

“You know her?” said the lieutenant?

Jason didn’t respond.

“There’s no point in holding back.” The lieutenant prodded Jason’s head with a spiky finger. “We’ll suck all the good stuff out of the there soon enough, once it’s properly chilled.”

They turned a corner, and for the moment no one else was in sight. Now is as good a time as ever, Jason thought, and with a convulsive jerk, he tore himself out of the biomechanical human disguise, the human skin splitting as his lithe form spilled out. The limbbinder held on to the arms of the disguise, but his real arms were free. The Dawkin, with a slow air of annoyance that was almost boredom, reached for his sidearm -- but he never got to it.

Grimacing, Jason tore off the disintegration mine he had been wearing on his chest since a couple of re-suitings ago, when they refreshed his human disguise. There were times when it itched and he had cursed himself for wearing it, but now his slightly paranoid planning was going to pay off. He slapped the mine on the lieutenant’s chest and spoke the activation word.

“You little --“ growled the lieutenant, but he was choked off as the mine detonated, sending a charge through his body that dispersed him into his component molecules. He vanished in a burst of silent light, and water vapor blasted Jason’s face for a moment.

Jason felt light and incredibly free after being in that damned costume for so long, but he was also getting cold. He heard footsteps and sprang up, flattening himself against the ceiling as he modulated his skin color to match the dull pink of the corridor. Not very close; he hoped it would do. Two Dawkin peons stumped past below him, intent on wherever they were going.

OK, good, Jason thought. Now what?

---

#28
The lieutenant gave Jason a vicious shove forward. Jason stumbled and he hit the ground hard, unable to catch himself with his bound arms.

Why, Hedra? Why?

“Get up, brainwaste,” the Dawkin barked. “I don’t have all day to spend on the likes of you.”

Jason struggled to his feet. As he lurched forward again, he noticed that Hedra had stopped. She stood silently in a doorway a few meters away from him. Under what remained of her human camouflage, the pale Leganty face that watched him was distant and impassive.

Jason looked away. He was no more to her than one of Earth’s many gnats. Oh, how wrong he had been. Stupid. So stupid.

The Dawkin roughly directed him up another level. Here freezing chambers lined the corridors. From some, sightless eyes stared out of the faces pressed against the glass; in others, only the faintest outline of a form could be seen through the ice. The lieutenant forced Jason into the first empty one they came to.

“Enjoy,” the Dawkin said with a laugh. Then the door swung shut, bolting with a thud that echoed in the small space.

Jason pushed against the glass, trying in vain for the release he knew he would not find. Already he could feel the dizzying effects of the gases pumping into the chamber to prepare his tissue for immobilization.

A face swam into focus beyond the glass. For a moment he thought it was the Darkin, but that wasn’t right. He blinked and his eyelids grated against the fragile human eyes he wore. No it was someone else. Hedra.

There was nothing impassive about her face now. Every inch of her expression was lined in pain and the sloping stretch of her forehead was colored with the strength of her emotion. Her mouth formed words, but Jason could not hear them through the glass.

Just as the spray jets fired, encasing him in the frozen material, he figured out the last thing she had said.

“I’m on your side.”

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited November 08, 2002).]

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited November 08, 2002).]
 

Luc

#26 -- 4 "Stretched his mouth in displeasure" was good. "ly" adverbs a problem -- would rather have been shown not told how characters were acting/reacting.

#27 -- 6 Loved the "silent light." "'Do you know her?' said the lieutenant." didn't fit his comments at the end of the previous segment, and his comments immediately after these confused me, but this had the strongest Jason of the three.

#28 -- 5 Liked the working of the freeze chamber but description of Jason's feelings a bit melodramatic.

---

25: 7- Well written, interesting, but a little too cute and convenient for me.

26: 9-I really like that you're holding on to the traitor thing, at least for a while. I don't buy Jason's being so easy with his real name in enemy territory. Sometimes the dialogue was weird.

27: 5- Why would the Dawkins be so unprepared/careless as to let Jason escape like that? Also, a little out of character--too cooly analyzing possibilities when his girl has just betrayed him.

28: 5- Kind of sappy for the story we're writing. Out of character for Jason. I liked that he didn't get away right off.

---

#25: 7
Like the way the not a traitor flip is worked with the android. Word "stupid" felt overused, even if it was for effect.

#26: 7
Exchange has good energy. Puts new spin on the Jason/Hedra relationship.

#27: 5
Didn’t like how Jason just happened to have a mine strapped to his chest, which he used now, not before to avoid capture in the first place.
 

25-5 Advanced plot well, but the "stupid" was overused.
26-7 Short, but engaging. Is she bad or isn't she still up for grabs.
27-8 Cool concepts of human "suit," Jason's ability to blend like a chameleon
28-6 Felt sorry for our poor Jason. Wonder how he's going to get out of this?
 

#25 - 7

#28 - 5
Liked the moment with Hedra on the other side of the glass, but felt like Jason was being moved along by the plot otherwise; I wasn't terribly interested in this as it moved forward.
 

25: 6.5
26: 6.75
27: 6.0
28: 5.25

Once again we seemed to be somewhat split. I noticed that the first two had Hedra taking definitive action and both kind of contradicted expectation, whereas the last two relied on Jason (one in which he escaped by himself -- fairly predictable, but as someone pointed out, probably not entirely convincing -- and one in which there was no character action but there was a brief moment between Jason & Hedra). Was this what we were reacting to, in part?

Interestingly, this piece makes both Hedra and Jason potentially less likeable and potentially more interesting. Even more interesting to me is that Jason is still not established as a character. I don't know if that's because him being taken definitively in one direction contradicts too many images of him, or if we've been so focused on events that we haven't wanted to "stop" and develop the character, or because we want to develop a story with a central character who (like Harry Potter and Luke Skywalker) barely has a personality, but is interesting because of the story he's in. Or maybe some other reason?

I also notice that so far we have not established anything that Jason can do to address the major conflict in the story, which I would say is the Dawkin takeover of Earth -- already well on its way, as we turned up the tension on that with the last piece. How the heck is Jason going to do anything about this? It seems like sooner or later, for this story to continue, we'll have to give Jason something difficult to try to do that would stop the invasion at great personal risk to him and which will involve Hedra and Gaff. Right? And also have it out between Hedra and Jason, because surely this isn't the end of the story?

It would be hard to write this from here with Jason doing something other than escaping and still addressing the invasion of Earth -- which has to be attended to right away! I could see him trying to hoodwink the Dawkin, or being rescued, come to think of it, but it's kind of difficult to keep us involved with Jason if he's just going to be paraded around by other people. If he's rescued, I assume it would be Hedra, Gaff (how?), some foil to Hedra, or a turncoat Dawkin, since anyone else would seem like a deus ex machina, right? Too late to establish human ties or other major characters who might show up, since he has to be rescued or escape or do something now.

About Hedra: She could be playing exactly how she is, or she could be a real traitor who's pretending she doesn't care for Jason for some reason, or a fake traitor who really does think he's a jerk, or a fake traitor who really is in love with him. Are there other possibilities?

And why are the Dawkins holding Jason and Gaff? If they want information out of them, why not get it right away? Does the invasion pertain to the conquest of Earth, or something even worse -- like the conquest of a series of Leganty-protected worlds? If Earth is conquered, can the story still go on, establishing the stakes as greater than Earth and (presumably) promising that Earth will be freed from the Dawkins if Jason succeeds?

Very curious for your opinions,
Luc
 

quote:

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I also notice that so far we have not established anything that Jason can do to address the major conflict in the story, which I would say is the Dawkin takeover of Earth… It would be hard to write this from here with Jason doing something other than escaping and still addressing the invasion of Earth -- which has to be attended to right away!

---

You know, I don’t think there’s really been an obligation built into what we have so far that requires Jason to take the hero’s seat and defend Earth. There are story influences for both the invasion related aspects and the Jason/Hedra/(Graff?) dynamic. If you push the second set of influences, the invasion becomes more of a backdrop to something else. And really, sure Jason is on the Planetary Protection Team, but what they were doing on Earth as a part of that hasn’t been fully defined. Maybe they were just researching or looking for something to protect their homeworld.

I guess I just don’t like the thought of being hemmed into a “Stop the Invasion” story – not yet anyway. That seems too predictable somehow. Now whether that last point’s really true, or I’m just not partial to alien invasion stories, is open to some debate.

 

Sorry for the silence. Unfortunately, we only received one piece this past week (even I didn't have time! Busy finishing my novel). May I suggest we give it another week to see if other entries come in (by Thursday), and if not decide on some new course of action, like ending the exercise, calling for pieces that end the story (however long they may be), or round-robin writing this or another story?

Luc
 

However, I look forward to reading what comes next. Don't take my loss of interest as a dissing of other folks' contributions...far from it, I think there were a lot of really nifty submissions. I'm just not feeling the muse, to be all lofty and stuffy about it.

[This message has been edited by Hildy9595 (edited November 21, 2002).]

[This message has been edited by Hildy9595 (edited November 21, 2002).]
 

I'm not nearly as excited about the story as I was, either. Are other people feeling this way? Glad you brought it up.

Maybe we've sacrificed having a story with long-term interest for one with short-term interest because we're writing it in small amounts? Or maybe it's just too hard to maintain interest in a story over the course of weeks and weeks? Come to think of it, I'll bet that has a lot to do with it.

Let's go with the suggestion that had been made in the past, to go round-robin, either to finish this story or to do the next one. Anyone can add onto the story at any time, but not more often than once every 48 hours (to give other people a chance). If two people try adding on at the same time, whoever's post gets added second should be cleared.

In a separate thread, we can talk about how the story's proceeding, what's working and not working for people, etc.

So, two questions:
1) Should we go to a round robin format? (If not, what would you like to do instead? End the exercise? Try something different? Do a new one the way we did this one?)
2) If so, do you want to continue this story or start a new one?

Luc
 

In a collaborative effort, you want to hash out the general storyline first, then let the individual writers draft the sections they feel best suited for, then "correlate" all the sections so that the timeline, event tree, background information, etc. are all consistent, then finally have everyone go over everyone else's draft for editing, then have all the final drafts written.

But I think that the story that you guys have come up with is kind of interesting so far, and hints at a lot of possibilities. Unfortunately, none of that potential can be explored with each writer competing to wrest the story off in a different direction.
 

Right. One entry in two weeks. I was thinking I would write one, but it seems as though we're not up to continuing in the same way.

Survivor, for my money we've been accomplishing what we set out to accomplish: not to write a great story, necessarily (although I do like this one so far) but rather to learn about what keeps a reader's attention from moment to moment.

I agree that if we were to want to write a good collaborative story, it would be much better to do it somewhat the way you are talking about, but then writing a story with even two people is dangerously close to madness. But ... too many cooks might be a really interesting exercise. Maybe we'd like to try some collaborative story-building before we try a round robin or other approach this time? We wouldn't be learning about the same thing, but it seems it would still be instructive.

Luc
 

[This message has been edited by JK (edited November 22, 2002).]
 

quote:

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being able to continue the story within the boundaries set up by the previous authors, I have increased my own writing abilities.

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There is the value in all this.

quote:

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There are always options we haven't considered, but the time to consider them is before the end of the submission deadline.

---

That includes options as to how to proceed. As a stodgy rules person, I would have taken whatever we had after the first deadline and gone with it. Otherwise we penalize those who make the deadline and therein lies frustration.

quote:

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Why put in the effort if the story can be terminated at any point?

---

Although I strongly dislike (adverb noted) the bend-the-rules-as-we-go-along method (it's too much like New Jersey politics) I would have chosen to go with what we had after the first extended deadline (even though that put us exactly where we were).

However, since we're (to me, inadvisably) considering switching horses in midstream, or spaceships in midflight, the lesser of the two evils (cliche noted) seems to be to extend another deadline and encourage JK and whoever else is so inclined (JK's rereading is key to the effort, I think) to write a segment. But whatever this next deadline is, let that be it. We go with whatever we have. Then we can switch to round robin or whatever. But at least the full turn has played out. (Although the "anyone write at any time" idea seems a blank check for chaos.)

[This message has been edited by Kolona (edited November 22, 2002).]
 

I guess my interpretation of the challenge was that the spirit, if not the letter, was that we would compare multiple options each week. That said, I realize I should have posted the work that was contributed for that week so that people can see where the story goes. My apologies to the writer for not doing that promptly.

So, the much-anticipated next installment:

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

Hedra turned away, leaving Jason dumbfounded. When a hiss and a frazzle
stopped her cold in her tracks, literally, Jason was not the only one who was
stunned. Hedra's expression, frozen in disbelief, probably matched Jason's
from just minutes before when she had turned on him.

The Dawkin who had retained his looting privileges grinned. "Put her in a
freeze chamber-next to that first one so she'll have company. Take this
one," he said, indicating Jason, "to the commander." He grinned again and
Jason wondered how he didn't pierce what looked like his lips with those
teeth. Jason had bit his own lip more than once in his Earth body, and its
teeth were straight.

He did not have time to consider the matter, though, because a great rumble
passed through the troop carrier and successive jolts brought them all to
their knees-or whatever it was the Dawkin called those bulges on their
legs-and weapons clattered to the floor. Twisting his body into contortions
not normally seen in an Earthling, but with the limbbinder pinning his arms
back, it couldn't be helped, Jason grabbed the freeze weapon as it skittered
past him. In a dual heartbeat, two Dawkin Popsicles, same disgusting flavor,
lay on the floor before the Dawkin could get to their feet.

Jason jumped to his just before he felt the carrier tilt. So we're still on
the ground. Damaged, but on the ground. That was good, but he suspected he
didn't have time even for a sigh of relief. If the Leganty were out there,
the Pulsar Disintegrator wasn't far behind. He knew it was only because they
were picking up Leganty life signs aboard that they hadn't disintegrated the
ship already, but the window of escape opportunity would be brief.

Straining his neck to see behind him, he studied the freeze weapon still in
his hands as best he could. /Where's the reverse on this thing?/ He fumbled
around for what seemed too long, then aimed the weapon at Gaff, striving to
hold it steady. Another hiss and a frazzle and Gaff was lying in a pool of
melt water. Instinctively, Jason aimed the weapon awkwardly at Hedra.

"No!" Gaff sputtered, climbing to his feet. "She's a traitor, Jason."
Gaff's teeth were chattering, but the look on his face spoke his usual
clear-headedness. "It's too late for her. It has to be."

Jason hesitated, then nodded bitterly as Gaff retrieved a laser gun from the
floor. He had the limbbinder off Jason in a flash and they were sprinting
down the troop ship corridor in mere seconds. Wondering if he would ever be
sorry, Jason spared himself a last glance at Hedra.

The ship shuddered as they ran, and the freeze weapon and laser they had
borrowed brought down the Dawkins who obstructed their path. More than once,
freeze and laser rays and blasts from blasters cut close around them, and
twice Dawkins gave chase, but Jason's and Gaff's lighter-gravity-enhanced
advantage proved its worth. The bedlam on the Dawkin ship didn't hurt,
either. Jason and Gaff exited the ship over frozen and dead Dawkins who had
been trying to escape the pulsar that they, too, knew was coming, but who had
the misfortune of being in Jason's and Gaff's way.

As the two fled the carrier, the awful inside-out hiss of disintegration
sounded behind them like a colossal intake of breath, a hiss that was being
repeated all around and above them in the night as Dawkin ships disappeared
with wonderful but terrible frequency. High above Earth, Jason knew, Leganty
battle cruisers were eradicating the Eradicators, unbeknown to Earth tracking
stations. Veiling devices shielded the Leganty ships according to Grand
Council requirements, while the same devices shielded the Dawkin, satisfying
their desire for stealth to move against Earth.

With a renewed burst of speed inspired by pursuing Dawkins, Jason and Gaff
headed for the Leganty ship that had touched down in the distance beyond the
cabin, waiting for them. Dual hearts pumping, Jason ran, now anxious to be
back on Legan, his ambiguity about leaving Earth gone.

Once he and Gaff were aboard, the Leganty would broadcast the Aftermath Field
that would disintegrate all life in the area, ridding the Earth of fleeing
Dawkin. It would take out all Earth life in the same area, too, but the
Leganty always sought to confine the field to as small a locality as
possible, carefully pinpointing the targeted life signs as their parameters.
They would leave the usual meteor and crater or vegetative pattern of course,
and, though Earth would be rich with speculation, it would never know what
had happened.

Gaff reached the ship first and sprinted up the ramp, but Jason felt himself
stumble, and something else. He hit the ground and rolled, feeling as though
he were finally experiencing true Earth gravity. The ship, the trees, the
mountains he loved, all wavered and fogged before him; there were flashes of
light and there was Gaff, sad-eyed and saying goodbye.

Jason thought of Hedra, and as he expelled his last breath, knew with a sense
of cosmic equilibrium that at least his body would be put to rest on Legan.

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited November 26, 2002).]
 

Hey, we have our separate area for this exercise now (the "Writing Decisions Stories" forum)! I'm starting us on a new story and a new version of the exercise that I think should address some of the limitations of the first one. Stop by if you're interested!

Luc

[This message has been edited by PaganQuaker (edited November 27, 2002).]
 

OK, we're ready to go with the new board. Thanks to the folks who have submitted story starts already. Anyone who would like to, please e-mail me at luc@meadowdance.org with it by Sunday, December 8th, at 9PM EST. Mercifully, we will only have a couple of deadlines to deal with using the new approach.

Once we post the starts, please go ahead and use the discussion thread in the "Writing Decision Stories" forum to bat around ideas.

Looking forward to this,
Luc