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Tag: Editing

Have to stop and take stock of what’s going on.

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So where are we in the broader sense of my story series. The Company has finally mobilized a newly built and as of yet untested fighting force. Flinging them from the earth’s moon base known as Torus station to head out to UB313 near Pluto Charon. Travel time estimated at nine weeks. The newly developed fire teams and walking tanks are in stasis aboard the Righteous Chord for the entire trip, but are suffering longer and longer migraines and waking nightmares, more often as the trip goes on. Attempts to awaken various types of soldiers has yielded unsatisfactory results.

The final straw to unleash the new fighting force was the mysterious death aboard the Dirty Starling of The Company’s oldest Admiral’s great grand son, also named Mark Garneau. However, there is another Ghost crew member named Mark, ready and waiting to assume the role should The Dirty Starling make its scheduled stop for resupply. A coincidence or something deeper? Conspiracy theory on the ship says brain worms, but the tech guys are looking for answers in the programming code for the nanotech upgrades. Could somebody have altered the code from the originals?

On the base UB313 Dr Jang has suffered a recent upset by finding out at least one of his away teams has failed to secure the asset. Lil Boat Peep has been destroyed, along with its crew, but what of The Mangelo? Rumors from Company moles say that the doctor has been building engineered soldiers from what he’s learned from his decades of unnecessary surgeries on unsuspecting corporate victims. Are they upgraded people or conglomerate monstrosities like the moles have been reporting?

It was also revealed that Admiral Garneau’s great grandson was disappeared by a secret protocol initiated by a tenacious mole aboard The Dirty Starling. How did the UB313 doctor know of the assets appearance out of thin air and where to look is a mystery. Who were the two modulated voices trying to take control of the ghost crew member? Who planted and sent the message out into the ether? What does the message say?

Out in the far flung reaches of the solar system a strange vessel has appeared out of thin air. It seems to move and replicate and change unlike anything seen before. But it knows about humanity with one humanoid artificial intelligence figure on board. The last surviving member of team Theta, named Racquelle, out of UB313, from the now inert rescue ship The Mangelo is still alive and being questioned. We learn that the mysterious android formerly known as Kelvin, is now named Katayna, and has taken on Racquelle’s appearance.

The wheels are in motion as all the forces are drawn together for a battle of the ages. Stay tuned for the remaining chapters of book two of this interconnected series.

I hope you’re having as much fun reading along, as I’ve had writing it all down in these weekly, and sometimes daily installments. After I complete the rough drafts here, I’ll go on to edit book two as a whole, then will make the updated version available on Kindle Unlimited. So stay tuned if you want to read it for free in its earliest form. All the best. Happy Friday.

What does forty three (43) days mean to you.

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I’ll tell you what it means to me. A flat plateau, and a bit of a slog. Feeling as though I’m treading water and gaining no new ground. However, on the upside, if there is one and I can call it that. There is a certain satisfaction in following along with the process and maintaining discipline. It’s not much, but it’s honest work. There was never any guarantee that a spark would ignite everyday. Just the knowledge that making the time, sitting down and doing the thing, eventually, something would come of it. Could be that I’m passed the creative hump, and I just need to wrap it up in another six chapters or so. Could be I’ll find myself thirty five hundred words into a chapter and think, oh this needs more context, this needs to be explored. Or I’ll wrap it all up an a bow, spring will arrive and I can work outdoors again. It could be that I have a fantastic supply of paid work and I am devoting more brain power to my business than I did at the tail end of December, and I’m not at peak, rested, creative writing performance. Could be I’ll hear a funny comment and that’ll take me off on a tangent. Maybe I just wanted to bitch and whine, then carry on as before. I can be fickle, so that’s why pushing along with the process is so important. Without it, I can flounder and then spend hours following YouTube rabbit holes. Life is weird that way.

On a typical day, I need to get my kids sorted for school: breakfast, lunches made, hair & teeth. Set out clothes for the youngest. Get their outdoor gear ready by the door. Drop them off and run errands. Then once I’m home I can check emails for priority clients, work, or sit down to my own breakfast and have a think. That would be when I bust out the trusty phone and clickety clack my way through a blog post, thought, joke or retelling of something that’s happened, or ruminate on what’s to come for my short story series. Then I’ll take some time for laundry, cleaning up, dishes and vacuuming, or scrubbing bathrooms and sinks. Then check emails again, if I’ve missed any notifications, and carry on.

I’m not writing an epic fantasy novel, so setting aside ten to fifteen minutes to publish something isn’t that big a deal. I try not to judge my work against others, but that’s really fucking hard to do. But I write for me, even if I do chase those view statistics some days.

Do any of you have a process you’d feel comfortable sharing? I should also note – as I have said previously; I write on my phone because sitting at my office chair is where I do my paid day job, and I want to be able to walk around, talk aloud, act things out as I go (if need be) rather than be perched at my desk longer than I have to be. Trying very hard not to get an RSI on my right wrist ever again. It sounded like twisting a leather glove when my tendons got inflamed. Oh that hurts, just thinking about it. Couldn’t rotate my right wrist & radius it hurt so bad. But I digress.

I hurt myself yesterday

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Trying to clear a path for my kids to toboggan down a really good hill at our family farm property. Caught a ski and flipped onto my elbow/shoulder like a forty something out of shape idiot, and now have a sore arm/elbow/shoulder. What’s worse is that I feel guilty for sending my kids back to in person learning. Ugh. It’s been really hard to sleep and it weighs heavy on my mind, all day, every day. No bruising as of yet from my physical fall. Probably won’t be any. Takes a fair amount to make me bruise up. Not as much to make me feel guilty.

Day 41, and what have we learned? Still not very eloquent or graceful with the written word. Feeling less concerned about the quality or quantity of my writing. At this point I’m aiming to have chapters done, not perfect, but a chunk at a time finished and uploaded for all to see. It can be an adrenaline rush once I get on a roll and I can see just over the horizon for something unexpected coming my way. I have a ways to go yet to wrap things up. I won’t give a quantitative answer to chapter count, but I know quality wise where I’d like to hit, and how I think I might wrap the story up in a nice little bow. I believe I had twenty two chapters for the first book, plus various one off shorts, and book two already has a few one offs written and compiled along with the twelve chapters I’ve written for book two.

I wonder if I’ll try to do something similar in another universe or if I’ll keep coming back to this well repeatedly. All the best to you for 2022! Keep on writing and sharing!

I had an interesting thought about a character yesterday.

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While writing part eight of my current short story series I introduced a new female character named Racquelle whom I rather quite like. I can see going off on a story tangent with her fairly easily, but the arc of the story I’m telling doesn’t really require her in that way. I suppose I could pocket her for some other stories later on. Or kill her off and use her daughter or niece to fill that space in a future short story series. Tough call to make. I can see her adding alot of humor and toughness to what I have planned, but I feel like she will need another two or three self contained problems to solve to use her properly if she is to live. Which could potentially hoop my plans, like a rough finger in the bum. What to do what to do. I know the broad strokes of what I want to happen and where the whole thing is to lead. It spans the galaxy, time and humanity as a whole. That’s alot of ground to cover for an interconnected short story series by an amateur writer. I think I’ll give in to my penchant for ballooning stories and characters. After all that’s how I wrote the first book chunk. Letting the people created within find their own ways to fix a problem or create new and interesting ones. All while heading ‘roughly’ in the direction I planned. But perhaps in a haphazard manner. I’m about to get busy with work, and I’m on day 36 or 37 of writing everyday, so I want to keep the momentum up, and the discipline in place. The habit of just writing nonsense blog posts was what triggered a vivid daydream, and hatched the second chunk of this series, so bonus points for perseverance I guess. Do I – kill off Racquelle unceremoniously, secret her away for a later date, involve her more deeply in the coming story, or ignore her for the sake of the initial story line I had half baked in the first place? If she works for me, like Ms Taylor did in book one, then she may stick around for a while, and do some crazy shit.

Here’s a useful quick tip.

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If you ever write a micro-short story that begins to spiral outwards into a multi chapter series of interconnected tales, that feel like pin points of light on a black blanket that eventually lays out a beautiful mosaic like final image; keep track of all of your character names, occupations, gender (if required) Race (if not human) and the names of the places that they inhabit, the ships / stations / vessel names and their approximate locations as you go along. Up until recently I thought I had a good chunk of it down pat, but then I couldn’t recall if I had used yellow as a colour code before, and it turns out I was using it for HR / and personnel related things. So I have gone back through 75,000+ words of interconnected short stories to retrace the steps of all of my characters, their whereabouts, and the proper spelling of vessel names, and their classifications. Funny how a handful of non-fiction micro shorts of 500 words of less, became an increasingly large in scale, scope and size science-fiction world of short stories, circling a semi coherent central narrative – via the use of multiple points of view, and sometimes contradictory accounts from characters with their own axes to grind. Also, quick tidbit – if you create made up names for in world technology; write that shit down.

To anyone who has read any of my short fiction, thank you! I know it’s not terribly polished, as I tend to publish as I go along. When I have an idea I want it out of my head as fast as possible, and I’m not shy about editing several days or weeks later. But the gist of the story stays the same regardless of catching a spelling or grammatical error after the fact. Keep on grinding it out, and make yourselves feel better.

In regards to my previous post about 3d rendering.

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I might be behind the eight ball here in terms of knowing about how to turn illustrations of uniquely shaped bottles into fully fledged 3d objects using Photoshop, but learning that work flow and then being able to chuck that stuff into Dimension and creating realistic looking mock ups is astounding. So glad I came across this stuff. No longer do I need to slave away drawing every bend of light or using finicky meshes. No no no, now you can draw up your custom bottle in illustrator, render the 3d shape in photoshop, with separate outer glass, inner liquid fill, cap and cork, plus add your various labels and tie that shit up with a fucking bow in Dimension with lighting effects, camera perspective matching to your background. Dear lord, it’s a game changer! I for one am pumped about what this could do for my beverage, and packaged goods clientele. Mind blown. I am tickled pink. Pleased as punch. Until next time.

Also – side note. I wrote a book of short stories available on Kindle, and kindle unlimited for $.99 USD. The Company – A series of interconnected space short stories by Mark Holyome. Available in 11 markets worldwide.

With the echos of the scream still bouncing off the protective shielding…

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The man falls heavily to his knees. The harsh bitter cold of the metal floor is bone chilling, and it seeps through the rough canvas coveralls at the point where his knees touch the ground. The thick icy grasp of the medical bay floor hits him quickly. With puffs of breath raggedly exhaled into the cold chamber the man is stricken with waves of fear. Bursts of crystallized breath plum out of his mouth with his dogged panted breathing. Outside of view beyond the protective barrier, ensconced in utter blackness, the rest of the medical bay appears to have deteriorated considerably. Heard amongst the rattle of his breathing are the insistent chimes of his wrist biometrics unit churning out error codes and warning notifications. Slowly rising to his feet, with a frail wobble to his steps, as though he hasn’t stood up in weeks or months the man stumbles towards the pale blue glow of the protective shielding he is standing within. The static fuzz ignites off of his finger tips, radiating through his palms and up above his elbows. The skin on his hands shimmers and pulses under the low voltage passing through it. Turning to sit with his back resting against the security shielding the man limply slides back down to sit upon the freezing cold floor. Feeling he harsh bite of the frosty metal against his rump. The static pulse of the shielding is accompanied by the shrill urgent chiming of the wrist biometrics notifications throwing up error codes and streams of data too small for the man to read. Looking down at the shimmering, rippling skin on his hands, his focus pulled away from the odd undulation of his flesh from the static from the security shield, he stares blankly at the wrist biometric unit. This is brand new he thinks soundlessly. “Yes… Yes it is”. Answers the empty darkness. Jumping to his feet, turning around, bare feet pattering the ground, the numbness now reaching his hips, the man screams again. A blood curdling, epic scream of madness. “Don’t be alarmed, we are you, that is to say, you are us. We are one. Do you understand?” speaks the disembodied voice, as clear as day, as though it were stood mere centimeters from his ear. Jumping with fright at each punctuated word, turning both this way and that, the man is frantic. Scattering bits of dust and debris, he searches the small med pod bay looking for the source of the voice. “No need to look for us, we are you, you are us, we are one. Together. Do you understand us. We know you speak a variant of the English language. Not American, nor British by Canadian English… yes?” speaks the voice in a slow drawl. Nod if you can hear us, do you understand the words you are hearing – Oh no. Here we go! Brace for impact… protect the head, protect the head! , make sure the tongue doesn’t slide back down the throat!”. The man crumples into a heap and promptly passes out. “Well, this is no good. We have to clear these notifications and sort out our access if we’re ever going to do anything useful with this vessel. We know, we know. Yes, I am aware of that. It does pose considerable challenges. No I am not currently aware of anything or anyone else quite like us, we… me.” The voices which can be heard sound muffled as though they were coming from another room down a shared hallway. Certain words are distinct but much of it flows together and is incomprehensible. Slowly everything fades to black, again.

**Another new installment of the interconnected space serial from 2020: The Chronicles of Kelvin.

In the stark white brilliance of the medical pods internal lighting…

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My vision fades from inky blackness to a dazzling white hot fire. Through the fuzz of far too dilated eyes in sudden brightness I can just make out my greyed, and cracked skeletal hand pressed upon the domed glass. The sensation of a deep cold burning the palm of my hand slowly crawls it’s way into my thoughts. Jerking my weak and flimsy hand back off the glass while tearing off the finger pads with the motion. The tear of the skin is audible like a seam popping on cheaply made pants. In the stifling silence I realize that I am alive, barely, and I do not know why. Left upon the surface of the glass are five perfect finger prints which start to flake off the frozen glass before my eyes.

The once plush and padded all white interior on which I am splayed is now all grey and faded to a crusty brown, spattered with spots of orange, yellow and mustard coloured stains. As I wriggle around in search of the internal release latch, dust plumes fill the air making me cough violently. The claustrophobic tightness of the painfully cold harness, the dazzlingly bright white lights, and choking clouds of dust add to my confusion and panic. The interior of the med pod is freezing cold, so cold I can see whisps of breathe and a crystalline pattern on the domed glass matching the outline of my hand print, now contrasted greatly by the dust particles cascading off my dissolving finger pads. The radiant glare of the lights is awfully blinding. My eyes feel as though they are on fire, as though I haven’t blinked in weeks. My throat is parched and feels cracked. My tongue thick and numb inside my mouth. My breath rattles thickly in my chest. I can feel my ribs creaking beneath my coveralls. An audible rumble of my intestines disrupts the silence, punctuated only by the ragged short breaths I’m taking. Peering through the frosted glass looking outside the medical pod I catch sight of something that is down beside and below me, decayed and worn is an oddly familiar Edubot of an orange colour. It is in a terrible state of disrepair. The tank like track treads have worn through completely and peeled off the guide wheels. It appears to have crept over to the side of the med pod to manually interface with the pods override functions. It’s lone protruding finger pressed firmly against the med pod reset button. But why? What possible reason would the ships medical bay have for cutting off life support. All I can see within the medical bay is the small pale blue illuminated circle encased in our atmospheric protection dome. A shimmering curtain of pure energy. The ship must truly be in trouble for this last ditch security feature to have deployed. By the state of the looming darkness beyond, the ship has been derelict for quite some time. Finding and triggering the latch to release the pods internal restraints with a loud click. Reaching up to push the fabric harness to the med pod out of my way I can see the ghastly grey pallor of my skin beginning to fade, and a bluish tinted pink replace it. As I watch there is a certain plumpness that seems to fill out my emaciated hands and arms. A flush of warmth rushing to my extremities, filling my chest and clearing my head. A sudden chirp from the biometrics on my wristband has started to chime with notifications. An error code I don’t recognize is flashing double time on the small OLED screen on my wrist, I must plug in to the med bays internal computer to figure out what is going on. I have never seen such a code before. The interface on my wrist biometrics is brand new, and not a model that I’ve ever seen. Everything is so strange. Colours and sounds are off kilter, at once too sharp and yet fuzzy. My balance is shot even as I am laying down. My limbs feel foreign to me. I begin to panic while I can’t find my equilibrium. My heart is thumping savagely in my chest. As I thrash about inside the med pod I finally pull the main release latch and the outer dome sweeps out into the open room. A faint tinge of machine oil and stringent cleaners can be tasted on the stale air. Mixed with ozone burning off the protective energy shield. A massive cloud of dust bursts forth with the air pressure change. Trying to calm myself I swing my legs around to try and step out of the raised pod. The once soft padding crumbling under my shifting weight. The cloth comes apart like parchment paper. There is a significant lag between thinking about putting my feet down on the step just outside the pod and my limbs actually doing it. The sensation is uncomfortable, like trying to pilot my own body from seven feet in the air above my head. Trying to swallow my rising panic I have to reach out and put my weight down on the Edubot as I clamber out of the medical pod. The sole of my foot sticks to the ice cold metal step, and the pain of the icy burn races up my leg. Peeling my foot slowly off the step, skin sticking to the surface, the pain makes me focus. Looking around at the pale blue shimmering safety curtain of energy surrounding the pod my attention is called back to the insistent chime of my wrist biometric monitor. “What is going on?” I croak into the silence of the illuminated med bay. My voice, not quite my own, or how I remember it, reverberates off the powerful safety shielding. Looking beyond the sizzling ghostly curtain of the atmospheric safety dome I catch my first glimpse of my reflection. I am not myself. The surface of my skin is visibly crawling. I scream.

**A continuation of the interconnected space serial from 2020: The Chronicles of Kelvin. – Follow along over the next few weeks (hopefully) for the remaining installments of the story.

The bug has hit…

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Storyboarding out the next five additions to my interconnected space short stories. It has been more than six months since I have contributed to the series, besides a one off short I released yesterday, which ultimately seemed to dislodge some cobwebs and allow me, mentally, to align my thoughts and make a coherent story emerge out of my head. But don’t worry, my themes of isolation, confusion, future technology are all going to be well represented. I looked over my notes which kept on getting longer and longer and realized that instead of one ridiculous seven thousand word dump of text, I could break it down into smaller and more manageable pieces and explore each new chapter of the story with aplomb. I had tried several times over the last half of 2020 to plot out some new work and the dastardly covid fugue, or pandemic fatigue was making that near impossible. I don’t know how long this kick in the pants will last but I feel better all ready.

Plot outline for new chapters.

I’m guessing this new literary kick started because I now have three pounds of clay on my desk with a new armature built, and designs for several wood working projects for my wife and children ready to start. We’re into a new lockdown with nowhere to go, so I guess this is how I will try to remain sane with the whole family home 24/7 , and the coldest stretch of the year upon our doorstep keeping us indoors for much of the day. Isolation was far simpler when you could just go swimming in the sunshine to while away a few hours each and everyday. Not so much fun when it gets down to minus twenty degrees with the windchill. Anyway, not that I have an enormous readership, or that there are more than a handful who have read all of the interconnected series from cover to cover, but I’ll be back at it soon enough. I hope you’ll join the returning cast and crew of The Company: A Series of Interconnected Short Stories.

Don’t get discouraged if I pepper in some non-fiction(ish) one off stories in amongst the serialized stuff. Some times my kids do funny or relatable stuff that makes for humorous micro short stories. Wheels up!

The harsh crunch of gravel on sand underfoot reverberates through my jumpsuit…

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Inside my helmet my breath comes in fast and ragged. I am sweating profusely under the brilliant shine of the triad of suns high overhead. We all struggle to keep our heart rates down, and our blood oxygen levels nominal. This scorching hot planet hangs with a red tinged sky. This horrid environment has little cloud cover, and is rocky, sand covered and almost entirely barren. The few scattered pieces of scrub brush are either a deep bruised purple or a sickly mustard infused brown. Through our helmets we can’t tell you what they smell like, but according to instrumentation we know they give of carbon monoxide and a mixture of cyanide and ammonia also. The team of scouts are being buffeted by a gale force wind. The rust coloured dust flies up hot as embers burning us through our environmental protection suits, clattering off our helmets and masks like white hot metal shavings. If we stand still for more than a couple of heart beats the soles of our boots begin to melt. The three suns range from a deep angry red to a near purple of absolute cosmic violence. In the distance of the horizon a herd of wild wandels can be seen racing hither and yonder. The tell tale sign of their presence are the mansteroud dust clouds that they kick up as they run. The uv blasted fines hang in the air, listing miles up into the stratosphere. The native beasts have to run everywhere in order to find food and to survive the intense heat once they venture out of their deep cave warrens. After our landing party had encountered them initially we determined them to not be a threat to us. The four legged over sized dog-bears had long thick tubular ‘hairs’ that they use to dissipate heat and keep cool. Tastiest beasts I’ve ever had the pleasure of finding on a back water planet. Not that we needed it, but the deep underwater aquifer that their warrens attach too allows the wandels to retain gallons of fresh water in a bladder under their bellies. Located in the only spot they can shade them from the over bearing sun light and oppressive heat. But we aren’t here to eat wandels, we’re here to find a rogue AI that has attempted to go off grid with her new found best friend. A crippled Pengar with only five limbs instead of six. Tiny miscreant of a thing. But a more brilliant ship wright and mechanic you will never encounter. Seems the Pengar named Errabor has developed a close relationship with our rogue AI Katayna, and we’ve been employed to locate them for the Company black ops sub contractor, one Mr. Boreck Kartcher. We’ve been paid handsomely, and I do not believe it was out of charity, but because he expects a good many of my fire team to die in the process. With great risk comes great financial reward.

Our first major clue to their whereabouts came from one of the tight beam communications repeaters that get sent off across the galaxy to try to maintain contact between every known quadrant of intelligent space. A random black box transponder ping from a supposedly decommissioned Falcon Heavy-Class star hopper went straight to the top of my in box marked most urgent. The second clue was the destroyed anti poaching gun platform that orbits this world being nearly obliterated by a head on collision with something super colossal. Put those together and we have a pretty good lead on our rogue elements. Scanning for life forms doesn’t really help us out, due to the protected wandels, sorry conservationists we ate two of them. Didn’t read the sign on the way down. Our bad. Plus the spec’s we got on Katayna says she isn’t classically defined as ‘alive’ , so much as sentient, and homicidal towards humanity. Hence the exorbitant pay we recieved for tracking her down and possibly bringing her back to Mr Kartcher.

PART THREE The Company: Sisters in Arms