|
Dark Windows Archives Index
|
Subscribe
|
|
| << July02, 2008 - Dark Windows #21 - July 1, 2008 |
August05, 2008 - Dark Windows #23 - Aug. 1, 2008 >> |
|
DARK WINDOWS #22 - July 15, 2008 ===== ===== ===================> INTRO Still not feeling well ... the best fit is a hiatal hernia, but doctors would give me anxiety meds instead. Rather than listening or thinking. So, new doctor on Friday. Some barium and a chest x-ray could clear it all up, but this massive system is in place to prevent solutions. So it seems. Skip all that. I've been a role-playing gamer for over 20 years now. May seem odd, since I may only sit in on a game a few afternoons each year. But that methodical way of creating places and characters has stuck with me, with the comical side effect that I have pieces and drafts of a bunch of alternate worlds nobody has ever seen. Just last week I sat down to make a quick fantasy town full of gags and clichees (for Risus), only to find that I had built a whole web of strange people, and I can walk the imaginary streets of the town when I close my eyes. I will probably dive in and write some of the stories someday. Finding markets for the actual gaming material is tricky. Sure, just like for fiction, there are lots of little publishers building collections of short works. The main issue is choosing a game system, but then if the market rejects the work, the whole piece may have to be rewritten using some other game system, which may lead to more markets that don't want it. It's like switching languages, a strange process. And the most popular game systems are so overbearingly complicated, the players must sit around a argue over numbers instead of enjoying a story. The simpler systems are mostly free, therefore there's no budget there, and I can't spend a lot of hours on something only to give it away. So many worlds, so little time. ;-) = scott ===================> POEM A Crystal Sea --- Soft rain somewhere drips on the Stones of Places, They sit in granite perplexity, Each Stone a portal, Each doorway a window; Moving through the rain, I pick up a stone -- A desert scene hides inside, I watch the caravan crest the dunes into distance, The dry warmth meets the rain; I return the Stone gently, My eyes pan across this place, Over this Crystal sea, Each stony wave a way, A gatepiece of hope; I choose my goal carefully, I pull the gate tightly against my skin, And I am gone from the rainy place; New Stones litter the new world, A permutational bliss of travel, There is rain in the rock of my palm, I know I am there, firmly, I pocket the return-stone, And my feet crunch through the hot sand. --- = Written 8/87, published in Stellanova v1#6 (8/88); Expressions newsletter (3/01). Note: This was a glimpse from a 15,000-word novelette by this name, which is not expected to ever see the light of day. ===================> ODD CLIPS: (clips from old "factual" sources) They believed that below the surface of the ground, and at the bottom of the sea, was a country called Jimbin, home of the spirit babies of the unborn, and the young of all the totems. In Jimbin there was never a shadow of trouble or strife or toil, or death, only the happy laughter of the little people at play. Sometimes these spirit babies were to be seen by the jalngangooroo -- the witch-doctors -- in the dancing spray and sunlight of the beaches, under the guardianship of old Koolibal, the mother-turtle, or tumbling and somersaulting in the blue waters beneath Pajjalburra, the porpoise. [1] The ngargalulla (baby spirit) is seen only by the men, and only by those men, I learned, who possess a 'ranji', a subconscious spiritual gift, a spirit, or mind as far as I could make out, corresponding to a soul. [2] The live totems go back to the sea and the land of Jimbin when their season is over, but the spirits of the human dead are carried away to the land of Loomurn, which lies over the western sea. [3] 1,2,3. Daisy Bates, Passing Aborigines ===================> STORY The Box Thing by Scott Virtes "It went into the box again," said the Ringmaster. "Hold on a moment." He reached behind the screen and rapped the metal construction that was lying there. The freak rolled out, jumping and gesturing. It ran over to a small stone. "I think they're pretty disgusting," said one of the viewers. His consort agreed. "Yeah, ugly." "What are they?" someone asked. The Ringmaster rubbed his face. "I'm not sure. I just found them in that weird box one day." "What about the green ones? Are they dead?" "Dead? I should say not! If you look closely, you'll see that they're molting. Shedding their skins as they mature. It takes a while to come completely loose," the Ringmaster proudly explained. "They smell nice," someone noted. "Why is it carving into the stone like that? It looks like writing!" The Ringmaster snorted. "It's just looking for bugs to eat." "Yech. What sort of bugs?" asked one of the children. "Little ones, my dear. Bugs about half their size. They hunt in very amusing ways, with snares, sharp twigs, direct combat. They're actually quite entertaining creatures." "Are you trying to say they're intelligent?" "I doubt it. Looks like primitive instinct to me. But as I was saying, I think they'd make good pets, even if they ARE ugly. When the female is done molting, I'll try to mate them. Maybe the young are better looking. They'd keep bugs out of our houses, and there's that nice smell. Could be quite a business venture." "It would never work. These things gross me out. You should squish them to a pulp and make perfume out of them. The oil might even have therapeutic value." "I never thought of that. We should still breed them first." The Ringmaster changed the subject. "Are we all done with the Box Things? Let's move on to my rockworm collection." The child took one last look. "Why is it hitting itself on the stone? What's that noise it's making?" The Ringmaster patted the youth on a shoulder-plate. "It's okay. Some creatures do weird things like that, you know. Wait'll you see the next exhibit." The crowd passed through the Hall. Their money spent, they crossed to the main tent to wait for the big show. The Ringmaster checked his watch. He still had enough time for another group, time to swindle some more cash from the innocent inquisitive. "Ladies and Gentlemen," he announced regally. "Step right up and view some of the strangest living things ever to grace this fine world of ours! You could start right off with a group of things that fell out of the sky in a strange metal box, things you simply can't see anywhere else! There is a creature here from a remote desert isle that actually eats stone! And more, more MORE. Twenty exhibits in all, for only ten hrand ... ten hrand! Ladies and Gentlemen, as a prelude to the Greatest Show on Nracxis!" His spell cast, they lined up to buy their tickets. Some paused to rustle their exten, others angled their kaxwas impatiently. The Ringmaster stared at the midday suns, livid in a red morning sky. A dry wind ruffled his feelers, warning of an approaching sandstorm. He scanned the horizon for it, glimpsing the vague discoloration on the southern horizon. It was still about two days away, which was good. The show would be moving east by then. He hailed his new group, and led them to the Box Things. One pink, seven green, and that lovely organic scent. --- = Written Jan 1986 (college days), once accepted by a zine called Chaos, but it folded before using the story. ===================> NOW AVAILABLE: Dark Windows #1-10 PDF! The first 10 issues are now available in a handy PDF file with some odd illustrations and extra notes. 65 pages, quite a stream of strangeness. Just zap $3 to writer@scvs.com through Paypal. ===================> DARKVISION: (captured dreams) "Play Lines" --- There was a high school football game going on, and the stands were sparsely filled with parents and girlfriends yelling at the various players. I was there to research something, but my little notebook sat on my lap completely blank. Right before half-time, some snowballs landed in mid-field. Then some more. Snowballs in July? From a mostly clear sky? This was followed by chunks of ice. People ran and hid under the metal bleachers, and the ice bombs came thumping and rattling down. It only lasted a few minutes, then there was a deep silence. People shuffled out of hiding places, patted themselves down, tried to connect with people they had been talking with mere minutes before. On the field, there was a player pinned down by a huge icicle. It was about four feet long and six inches thick at the base, and went right through his rib cage into the green field beneath him. The boy's helmet has come off. His face was white, then grey, then gone. There was nothing but straw stuffing the football jersey, and the icicle was a spear. The ground around the body cracked and a gap opened up. The ground settled about a foot, and the sod around the body slid down a step into an open space. There was a chalky white line running just a few inches below the surface, and we started digging away the dirt to follow it. It looked like the goal line, only stony, like a vein of white quartz running through the earth. We followed the white line to a right-angled turn, then got some heavy equipment and kept overturning clumps of earth as parents and kids wandered home for dinner. We found another whole football field beneath the surface, only larger than life. The yard marks were almost five feet apart -- the whole things was drawn up to the wrong scale. Then the earth cracked again and there was another white line just below the lower surface. This line was almost impossible thick and solid-looking, and we somehow knew we would never stop digging, never stop finding giants beneath giants. Yet all around us there were smaller ball fields, where microbes danced to inscrutable rules. But we humans only cared about giants. --- = captured 6/1/08 * Note: I have been compiling a book on weird things that fall out of the sky (including ice blocks), and had recently read about fossil bones of large creatures being part of the source behind ancient myths about giant humans walking the earth. ===================> MY NEWS: "Book of Tentacles" is chugging along, about 40% full. It inspired me to write a story called "P6 is Burning", which will be included in the anthology. Lots of silence otherwise. ===================> STORY BITES: (clips from old fictional sources) There came to be seen, far up the shore, a little flicker of something light-coloured moving to and fro with great swiftness and irregularity. Rapidly growing larger it declared itself as a figure in pale, fluttering draperies, ill-defined. There was something about its motion which made Perkins very unwilling to see it at close quarters. It would stop, raise arms, bow itself toward the sand, then run stooping across the beach to the water's edge and back again; and then, rising upright, once more continue its course forward at a speed that was startling and terrifying. [1] There was a dry, light, rustling sound all over the room as I went in, and then (you remember it was perfectly dark) something seemed to rush at me, and there was -- I don't know how to put it -- a sensation of long thin arms, or legs, or feelers, all about my face, and neck, and body. Very little strength in them [... but ...] I don't think I was ever more horrified or disgusted in all my life. [...] I roared out as loud as I could [... and] I tore at the curtain and somehow let in enough light to be able to see something waving which I knew was an insect's leg, by the shape of it; but, Lord, what a size! [2] 1. M.R.James, story: "Oh, Whistle, and I Will Come to You, My Lad" 2. M.R.James, story: "story: The residence at Whitminster" ===================> POEM A Mark of Darkness --- You scrape against my neck, We tangle in our passions, I trace the curve of your back, Idle fingers and hair, Pulled close in our dark blankets, Pricks like starlight on my throat, You teaser, patient hands, Lure for lure, differences grow, I push you away again, Never fooled, You seek arteries, I'm after answers, Both can be fulfilled, Neither goes thirsty, A tension -- In a painless flashing, Your impatient teeth, my pen, My hand trembles, you so flrm, We mark and become marked, In the trusting black turmoil, I scrawl my name on your back, Always. --- = Written 9/87, unpublished ===================> ABOUT THE AUTHOR Scott Virtes has had over 400 stories & poems published since 1986. Look for them in Analog, Space & Time, Ideomancer, Dreams & Nightmares, Cafe Irreal, Planet, and more ... My Home page: http://tales.scvs.com?inw=dkw Notice: Odd Clips and Story Bites all come from original sources in the public domain, or are brief clips in the spirit of fair use (a.k.a. free advertising for the source). All other sections of this newsletter are copyright (c)2008 Scott Virtes. All rights reserved. Please don't grab chunks of my work and post them all over the place. If you ask permission, you'll find that I'm pretty easygoing. ;-) ===== this issue: 2,170 words cumulative: 45,860 words |
|
| << July02, 2008 - Dark Windows #21 - July 1, 2008 |
August05, 2008 - Dark Windows #23 - Aug. 1, 2008 >> |
|
Dark Windows Archives Index
|
Subscribe
|
|
|
Archives powered by Zinester's Mailing List Service
Details on Dark Windows |
Browse for more newsletters at Zinester's Ezine Directory
Managed by Zinester's Mailing List Management |