litranaut

The mail sat on the screen. She stared at it.

 

We know her. We were at her birth. We saw her name passed on. We have even heard about the small place she sat now. And as our point of view focuses on her flushed face we know realise that we don’t, actually, know her name.

 

Which, all things considered, is the point.

 

However, we can see that she is furious. 

No one should be able to find her. No one. Least of all him.

 

Coffee? What the fuck did he mean by that?

 

Bastard.

 

She hit the reply button and hammered out a response.

 

“How the fuck did you get this address. No, forget that. I don’t want to know. I don’t want you to reply to me again. Not after what you did.

 

Our time for coffee is long gone. You made that very clear the day you grafted that metal arm to you and betrayed everything we stood for. You and your teams – your cells.”

 

She paused. People had been hurt her way, too. And she knew his teams had always been careful.

 

Of course she knew, she checked. It was her job.

 

“Just…fuck off!” She yelled at her laptop, sure that it had been offended by the outburst.

 

One of her cats rubbed round her legs and she picked it up, crying tears of vehement frustration into its fur. Her hand went to her keyboard and she hit a key and stormed from the room.

Drafts: 1

***

 

Drafts: 5

 

Coffee? What did it mean? And why nothing else?

 

She hit the refresh button. And again.

 

And…again.

 

But as it was now three days since it arrived and she figured nothing else would be following it.

 

Christ, this was annoying.

 

Coffee? What could he have possibly meant by that. She thought of all the ways they had used it.

 

“Would you like to come up for a coffee?”

 

The eye contact. The smile. The lips. The kettle boiling dry in the background. She remembered the passion, the clothes being torn aside. She remembered –

 

Her hands flew to the keys again.

 

“So that’s your plan is it? You think you could sweet talk me into bed? Just like that? How easy do you think I am?

 

And how the HELL  did  you get this address. I told you never to contact me again – you and your cells, your metal body. How was that going to help? What on earth …

***

 

Drafts:10

 

“Bastard message.”

 

She needed new eyes on this.

 

“Lucy.” Silence reigned.

“Lucy.” Still nothing. 

 

She sighed. “Lucy.” Sharper this time, a little harder.

 

“Yes, madam.” It was a male voice that answered, which reminded her that she needed to spend more time on her home system.

 

“Lucy. Coffee.”

 

“Ma’am.” She heard a noise from the kitchen. “Latte, ma’am?”

 

“Nono. I don’t want one.” Useless technology. “Definitions. What does it mean?”

 

“Coffee: A drink made from the roasted and ground beanlike seeds of a tropical shrub, served hot or iced. Coffee: a party or reception at which coffee is served. Coffee: A widely consumed stimulant beverage prepared from roasted seeds“

 

The voice droned on.

“Ugh.” She walked away to get her Latte.

 

***

Drafts: 18

 

She looked at her mug and clicked on the Drafts folder. She command-A’d all her previous attempts and deleted them.

 

“Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.”

 

She hit the reply button and typed her response.

 

She waited, re-read it just to be sure, then hit send.

 

Smiling, she walked to her garden.

 

?

When all was quiet, the storyteller/shaman/elder/priestess/actor/chieften started his tale.

“It was the dawn of man.

===

It didn’t come in the dark, It was the dark.

It cared not for numbers – there was no safety there. 

You could not hide. You could not run.

Male. Female. Offspring. All were taken with impunity. 

There was a reason of fear the sun going down and it had nothing to do with it not coming back again.

 

Light was the first defense. Huddled close to the light, the Dark was held at bay, howling at the edges where its power dimmed. It picked off those who strayed beyond the protective circle, killing its prey slowly; making each and every scream count, taunting those safe inside to come out. Come out and help.

But none did. They closed their ears and rocked, some screaming, some wailing. Most crying.

One fateful night, a child rolled in its sleep, falling outside the ring. It was snatched in an instant, her cries ringing out. Close she was brought, so all could hear her begging, her screaming and even though she had no words, every cry tore at the heart of all in the tribe. All but one. A hunter. He steeled his heart and listened – tracing the child, predicting her movement.

His hand flew into the fire. Ignoring the flames that seared his fur, the smell of his arm burning. 

He grabbed a burning branch and ran into the night. So shocked was The Dark by the brazen attack that it had no time to act. The light illuminated the child. 

With no dark to hold her, she fell.The hunter leapt, grabbed and rolled. She didn’t even make it to the ground. The hunter returned her to the wailing women who preened and caressed the child.

The Hunter didn’t stop moving and made a fire at a greater distance. Then with grunts, screams and points he organised the other males to do the same. Soon they had a perimeter fence, a greater area of safety.

No longer would they lose their own to the Dark. They had fought back.

They had a victory.

They had a Hero.

 

===

 

The Tribe moved left the plains and headed into the caves. Armed with their fires, they drove the dark away and won another victory. Within days the walls were covered with images of the Great Hunter’s deed. The child hung around him, adopting him as her mentor, her protector. Soon the scarred pair were inseparable, the child aiding hunt. 

And every night, with the child sleeping in his lap, the Hunter stared at the images on the wall.

The Rainy Season rolled in and the Tribe were forced further into the cavern system, as the water extinguished the fires set up around the came mouth. To keep spirits up, one of the Tribe took to performance and, through actions, retold the story of Brave Hunter – much to the hunter’s embarrassment and the child’s pride.

One such night, at the climax, a victory howl from Dark stole the story. 

It had not been defeated. Only made angry, forced to feed on other tribes.

Mothers held their children closer. Men held their women.

And the Hunter stared at the images on the wall.

The next day he took the performer and the child and set out across the plains.

Every tribe they met the hunter taught to make fire. Every night, by those same fires, the performer showed how the Hunter saved the child. The stories were performed, copied, re-performed. And, slowly, the Tribes of Man fought back against the Dark.

The metronomic clack-clack-clacking of It’s monstrous nails impatiently counted off the seconds.

It stood, huge and black, it’s calcified head elongated and deformed with age. It’s fingers clack-clack-clacking out time as it passed.

With a groan of bones being ground against bone, It’s head dropped to one side.

It listened.

The black Munch “Scream” holes it had for eyes had long since ceased to take in light. But what did it need to see for?

***

He stood, mug of tea in one hand, plate of food in the other, and the phone nestled between his ear and his shoulder.

He scanned his flat. There was washing up in the sink; clothes to be washed in an overflowing basket.

“Nah, not so busy. What do you need?”

He listened. “Uh huh. Ok. But just two minutes, right? Because there is some stuff I was hoping to get done.”

He listened some more. “Cool. Let me log in and I’ll see you there.”

He waited for the other side to disconnect and let is phone fall onto the sofa, before setting his food down and firing up his machine.

***

It shook and forced air from its body in excited hisses. It’s finger nails clack-clack-clacked constantly as it rubbed its swollen, calloused fingers together.

The Clacking stopped. It’s hands poised, held still over a time stream.

Waiting now.

Waiting…

***

“Ok – just two minutes.”

***

– before stabbing into it – bursting the seams, slicing ragged wounds in the ordered flow. Time bled out as It’s nails slashed and hacked onwards, ever onwards, ripping hours from the line. Deftly It scooped them up, wiping them on Its cape.

And all the while, it whined and hissed and shook, flecks of spittle forming at the rictus frozon on its face.

Once It had finished, the figure turned in on itself, becoming a plane, twisted, becoming a point, and winked out.

Where it once stood, a timeline flapped, Time hemorrhaging from the multiple lacerations that had been inflicted on it.

***

“Shit – is that the time? What the fuck have I been doing all night?”

***

Home sang with the sound of sand blowing. It scrapped the remains of It’s attack from its cape and flicked the stolen hours into those that already littered the landscape. It pondered syphoning off the free flowing time from the last attack but shook It’s head, the grinding bone again.

It preferred the idea of it bleeding away.

Just audible above the constant hiss, and the regular clack-clack-clacking of its nails was a keening. The Figure stepped into the building it was coming from.

Inside, strapped to a rack, was a man. He was stretched to breaking point. There were signs of tearing and fraying at his edges – multiple slashes were visible on his face and body. There was a point he had been rounded, more jovial but that was long ago.

Long ago experientially. Time meant nothing for The Figure. Meant nothing where they were.

Not that that comforted Free Time.

He drew a ragged breath. “What ever you’re planning. It won’t work. People will miss me.”

The Figure regarded It’s captive.

Pondered.

Then limped towards the him, dragging It’s mass as it did.

“Keep away. Don’t come near me!”

It pushed Its face close. Deep within the empty eye sockets, a light grew. It extended a finger on each hand, scraping over wounds at Free Time’s temples that hadn’t even begun to heal.

“Please. Not again.” He sobbed.

The Figure shook and hissed, spraying his captive with spit.

Then slammed the nails in.

***

Free Time’s screams were drowned out as he watched the scene presented in his captor’s eye sockets.

Major Goals was looking over a map pinned to a table. On the other side was Private Dreams.

Goals was speaking. “We’ve got the first wave set up. They’re ready to roll out. We’ll hit them where they least expect it. But it’s not a frontal attack. Oh no. It’s an insertion. We’ll just paste some shock troops in.”

Dreams just nodded. The captive could see this was going over his head.

“Dreams, I need you to find me someone. He’s in here somewhere. Name’s Zarkophski. He was always great at this kind of thing. And the weirder the shit going down, the better he likes it. This is right up his alley.”

***

The Figure yanked its nails out. Free Time was visibly more haggard. Time had been sliced from him, and now tripped from It’s fingers.

The Thief of Time raised itself to its full height, the fossilized structure protesting against the excess of movement, threw it’s head back and let loose a moan. It shook violently, the nails clack-clack-clacking as this limbs jerked, spastically.

Everything was going as planned.

Good Grief.

Look at this, it’s the middle of the month and now there’s news.

So – what to say?

Well, first off – sorry about the whole One Story a Day, Every Day thing. As you can see from the hurried excuse sent on my birthday, things are a little hectic here. I’m going to start sectioning off time to do some writing and I’m going to aim for 2 or 3 stories a week, until things quieten down.

So – if there was ever a time you wanted to submit something, now would be the time to do it.

Actually – there’s a lot of news this month so let’s start with…

The Archive: Is now work again. I tweaked a way of referencing pages and the whole thing went down.

There – now that’s out the way. Content. For the next while I’ll be tinkering with the stories on here. They’ll be as often as possible – two to three a week – but there’s going to be some running themes and some recurring characters.

The stories will continue to be self contained, so there’s no need to worry about not being able to leap in at any time. The themes will be:

The War on Real Life. What was merely a way of saying “Sorry. There’s been a lack of stories” has taken on a life of its own. There’s a lot of material ready for this, including Refugee Stories – stories written in the style of a young child, a wounded soldier etc.

Litranatuics: I recently moaned that I wanted a Vurt. I wanted a world where things could happen that were necessarily strange and…and…wait..that’s what I based the whole thing on. Hacking Reality. So, there’s a world of Litranaut material on its way too.

Erotic Outlaws: A couple of years back I made some notes for a web-comic. It was based on a couple who spread excitement into an otherwise gray world, and on the group that has been assigned to catch them. The notes incubated (read – were forgotten about and now have resurfaced) and the stories will be edited for text only.

The Usual: And on top of this there’s also the usual run of odd, off the wall, touching, strange stories that will grace these pages.

***

 

I’ve been reading a book on games as narrative: First Person. New Media as Story, Performance and Game and it’s companion . The first one is a little dated, but it’s got some amazing ideas. One of the things is that storytelling in new media shouldn’t look like storytelling in current media.

Which got me thinking.

I’m going to toy with the idea of some more experimental storytelling – hypertext, voice, treasure hunt games, semacodes etc.

Now – I’m not sure how that’s going to fit in with the RSS readers, so there’ll be an imprint for that. If/when that kicks off, I’ll yell about it here.

***

And in General News: I Has Ginger. My netvibes page can be found here. It’s not so pretty, as yet, but it’s a start.

And finally, an artist friend of mine has his portfolio up. He is amazing. He’s worked on a bunch of movies and I’m also collaborating with him on something. You can find his work here, and he’ll be going into the links ASAP.

 

So – that’s your lot. On with the stories.